


Time and Time's Turning

by RainbowMartin



Category: Cartoon Therapy (Web Series), Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, But also, Fairy AU, Fluff, M/M, Other, Royalty, Slow Burn, Villain Deceit Sanders, Wings
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-02
Updated: 2019-08-02
Packaged: 2020-07-29 05:20:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 24,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20076799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RainbowMartin/pseuds/RainbowMartin
Summary: A young human boy named Patton escapes his abusive mother when a fairy Prince finds him in a circle of mushrooms and brings him to the fairy world.





	1. Roman

**Author's Note:**

> I have no real update schedule bc writing is hard, but come chat w me on tumblr @rainbow-sides and/or leave nice comments and I'll probably feel more encouraged to write lmao <3 love y'all

The tapestries draped along the polished marble walls of the palace absorbed and muffled the echoes of soft slippered footsteps down the hallway. Starlight sparkled and streamed through the windows as the young Prince Roman walked past them. His wings were folded behind him, their bright oranges and reds concealed behind the drab brown of the undersides. Silken nightclothes hung over his small frame. One of the buttons that kept the shirt over his wings had come undone, and the shirt had slipped down over his shoulder. He made no move to fix it.

His sleepless nights had grown worse recently. He had, of course, always _ known _ that he was different from his mother and father. His mother’s regal monarch wings marked her as being of royal blood, and his father had once been human. The fact that he was not born of them had never really bothered him before. He knew that they loved him.

But lately there had been...comments. Whispers. Roman was nearly 17 years old, and his coming of age ceremony that would mark him as able to take the throne was fast approaching. There were many who believed that this boy, abandoned in his hatching-circle and taken in by the royal family, should never be considered a real Prince. The Queen had fallen for a human-turned-fairy and could therefore not have children of her own. Her younger brother’s child, Valerie, who had the monarch’s wings, had a valid claim to the throne. The youngest of the Queen’s siblings had a son named Terrence, who also could have tried for the throne. But the Queen insisted that Roman was her son and therefore the rightful heir.

Roman wasn't so sure anymore. His wings were rough around the edges, ragged. The butterfly they mimicked was called a _ question mark _. Fitting, really, for a boy who didn't know exactly where he belonged or where he had come from. He was young. He didn't know who he was yet. He wasn't prepared for the responsibility of coming of age and knowing that, should his mother die, he would have to become King. He was frightened and insecure, and he heard everything that the nobility whispered about him. 

Unable to turn to his mother or father for fear that they would realize how truly unfit he was to be their son, and knowing that his tutor wouldn't know how to offer him the sort of comfort he desperately craved, Roman had taken to wandering the palace at night. One of the very few people that he could really consider a friend had been nowhere to be found for the past few weeks, and Roman was close to tears.

Tonight, though, a voice rang out from the shadows. “Hey-hey, baby princeling, whatcha doin’ out of bed this late?”

Roman grinned and turned around to face his friend. They were a sprite, with soft, fluffy white moth wings and silver-blue skin. Their name was Remy--or, that was what everyone started calling them when they had shown up in the palace several years ago and set up residence there. Nobody knew where they had come from or if they were really allowed to be there. But they were always there when someone needed a pep talk or a cuddle, and right now, Roman needed both. “Where have you_ been _, Rem? You disappeared on me again.”

“Sorry, darlin’, but I've got places to see and people to be,” Remy quipped. They had a mug of something in their hand, which they sipped through a reed straw. They had glasses made of a dark crystal, protecting their nocturnal eyes from sunlight during the day and remaining on as part of their personal aesthetic at night. Queries as to whether the glasses made it difficult to see in the dark always went unanswered. “But really, why are you awake, my fine little diurnal friend? It's the wee hours of the morning when pretty princeling fairies should be tucked up in bed.”

“I can't sleep,” Roman admitted. “I haven't been able to in days.”

“Oh?” Remy looked concerned. “Why so, baby prince?”

“That's just it, I'm not a baby prince anymore.” Roman leaned against a rare patch of wall that wasn't covered in a tapestry. “I'm going to come of age in two months, and I'm not even sure I should _ be _ a prince.”

Remy linked their arm through Roman’s and pulled him along down the corridor. “Now who's been telling you that, princey? I can take care of them for you if you gimme the names.”

After trying and failing to laugh, Roman shook his head. “They're _ right _, though. I'm no royalty. Just look at my wings.”

Remy halted and walked in a circle around Roman, examining his wings from every angle. “I've looked at ‘em.”

“Well, they aren't the wings of a monarch, are they?”

“They ain't a monarch butterfly’s, but any wings can be a monarch’s if the person with the wings is royalty. And you, baby prince, are some of the surest royalty I've ever met.” Remy reached out and ruffled Roman’s hair.

Roman rolled his eyes, wanting to lean into his friend's hand but holding back. “You're just saying that.”

“I am saying it, ‘cause it's true, princey,” Remy retorted. “And anyone who says different is lying to ya. C’mon, Ro-ry, let's getcha to bed, mm-kay?”

He let his friend lead him to the window, where they leapt out to fly leisurely across the gardens and into the eastern section where Roman’s quarters were. Remy sat down on Roman’s wide bed and patted their lap.

“Come here, I know you want cuddles,” they teased gently.

Roman yawned and crawled into bed. He sprawled out on his stomach across Remy’s legs and let his wings relax. “So you think I'll be okay as King one day?” he mumbled.

“Oh, honey, you're gonna be _ great _. Don't you worry about the people who say that you won't because of where you came from. Your mama knows better than they do, hm? Would she have taken you in if she didn't know you were going to do great things? That magical beauty? Absolutely not.” Remy fixed the button that had come undone on Roman’s nightshirt.

“But when I do screw up, they're all gonna blame it on my blood,” Roman said. “Nothing I ever do will be separate from that.”

“Uh-huh, princeling, and you gotta deal with that. But your mistakes aren't gonna define you if you don't let them.”

“But--" Roman let out a whimper as Remy started scratching his back lightly. The sprite’s fingers were brushing over the part of his back between his wings, which Remy knew perfectly well was the best way to get him to stop talking. “No...fair,” Roman whined, arching his back slightly to press harder against his friend's hand. “Remy!”

“Hush now, princey, no more arguing. You're gonna go to sleep now so you stop talking yourself down.” Remy kept scratching softly, rubbing at the muscles that controlled the wings in a way that made Roman melt.

“No fair,” he said again, but his eyes were already closing.

Remy hummed quietly. “You came looking for me, princeling, what were you expecting? I don't play fair, I win. It's not my fault you have an off-button.” They pressed at the spot for a moment, proving their point when Roman went completely limp and exhaled loudly. “Don't worry,” they murmured. “I won't tell anyone that the future King of the fairy world falls asleep in my lap.”

“You better not,” Roman muttered. A shiver ran down his spine as Remy touched a particularly sensitive spot. “Do you think that I'll have a human at the ceremony? Mother says it's good luck, and if I can find one in a fairy ring, I can take them here.”

Remy clicked their tongue. “Superstition, baby prince. You don't need a _ bit _ of luck.”

“That's what Logan said. Well, the part about it being superstition. But Mother met Father because he was the human at her sister’s ceremony. And I've never met a real human before.” Roman yawned. “When it gets closer, I want to find one. I'll go to all the fairy rings I know of. There's bound to be a human in one of them.”

“Humans don't come into the forest anymore,” Remy told him, their hand coming to rest at the nape of Roman’s neck while they spoke. “They haven't for years and years, Ro. There's something out there, something that whispers lies and leads travelers astray until they're never seen again. It happens to fairies, too. So don't you go out lookin’ all by yourself, princey. Bring a friend or three. Safety in numbers.”

“I don't have three,” Roman muttered. “I have two. You and Logan.” He squirmed under Remy’s hand, trying to get them to start scratching again.

With a sigh, Remy complied. “Well, bring Logan, then. Goodness knows the weird guy could use a field trip.”

“Leave him alone,” Roman defended. “He's my best friend, only I get to call him weird.”

“Aw, honey, the fact that your only two friends are your tutor and _ me _ is kinda sad,” informed Remy. They pinched at Roman’s side lightly, grinning at the resulting squeak.

“I've got Bubbles, too!” Roman defended.

“Your dopey little water dragon? She's cute, but she doesn't count as a friend,” Remy said.

“I'm not _ lonely _ or anything,” Roman insisted, but his words were hollow and Remy knew it.

“Sure you're not, baby prince.” Remy stroked the prince’s nose gently, making him close his eyes. “Go to sleep, little princey, that's it. You don't have to be lonely right now, at least. I'm here.”

“I'm not lonely,” Roman said again. He was already falling asleep. It was summer, and the warm air of the palace seemed almost like a blanket over him. Remy’s thumb kept petting down the length of his nose, from bridge to tip. “I...I haven't been able to sleep in days,” he breathed. “How do you do it?”

“Ahh,” Remy hummed. “Magic touch, honey. Now shh, stop talking. Baby prince needs his beauty rest, hm?”

Roman slipped into a dream. 

_ He sat on top of a mushroom cap and watched the sunlight dance past while the laughter of some faraway person called to him and begged him to be their friend. Roman flapped his wings, trying to take off, but the mushroom was being pulled down into the mud and was taking him with it. His feet were already stuck in the mire. _

_ He tried to call for help, but he was sinking fast. As much as he struggled, he couldn't stop the mud from enveloping his legs, then his waist, and then his wings. He screamed as the sticky mud reached his chin. “Help me!” _

_ But the voice in the distance kept laughing. It couldn't hear him. And then the mud poured into his mouth and nose and covered his eyes-- _

He woke up with a cry, breathing hard.

He was alone in his quarters now. That wasn't surprising. Remy never stayed for long after Roman fell asleep. As they said, they had places to see and people to be. But Roman wished that they had stayed tonight.

Roman stepped out of bed, still panting and shivering from the nightmare. He had to look down at himself to assure himself that he was clean and not covered in the suffocating mud. His nightclothes were still pure silky white, and he breathed a sigh of relief. He walked over to his wide, open window and stepped out onto the balcony.

The sun was just barely rising. A faint orange glow tinted the horizon, but the sky was still dark. Roman gazed up at the fading stars. He shivered, though he wasn't cold at all. As he flapped his wings once to rise up enough to sit down on the edge of the roof with his legs dangling down, he began to sing softly. His heart was still racing from the bad dream, but singing usually calmed him down. His voice rang out, clear and sweet and low, across the palace rooftops and sweeping along the city below.

“_ One says the forest _

_ Can be seen through the trees, _

_ And that the sun keeps rising _

_ And setting as it pleases. _

_ One says the river _

_ Will wind down to the sea, _

_ And the rain will be falling _

_ When it wants to be. _

_ One says time will pass _

_ In the manner it will choose, _

_ But when the sun keeps rising, _

_ It seems that time will lose. _

_ Say my love will return _

_ Like the river to the sea, _

_ Or that my voice, singing, _

_ Will bring them back to me. _

_ Say my love will come back _

_ In time and time’s turning, _

_ Or that sunset through the trees _

_ Signals my love’s returning.” _

Roman took a deep breath, having calmed down significantly. He repeated the final verse, letting his voice rise and fall and rise again in a crescendo of smooth notes.

_ “Say my love will come back _

_ In time and time’s turning, _

_ Or that sunset through the trees _

_ Signals my love’s returning.”_

_ _


	2. Logan

Logan was absolutely determined to see the human world.

No matter how many times his parents informed him that it was dangerous, especially for a child who didn’t know anything about how the world worked, he was still determined. He  _ knew _ how the world worked--at least the fairy world. He had been observing and coming to conclusions about it since he could fly by himself, exploring and learning. And now he needed to learn how the human world worked. It was the logical progression of his education, the education that his parents refused to give him.

His older cousin Emile tried to stop him. “You’re only six, Logan, and I know that you’re smart, but you can’t go to the human world by yourself.”

“So come with me.”

“It’s too dangerous! I don’t ever want to go to the human world, and neither should you.” Emile looked at him sternly. “Promise me you won’t try, little one.”

“I promise,” Logan lied. He knew he shouldn’t be lying to Emile, who was the only person who ever really listened to him, but he  _ had _ to go. He had to learn.

So the next day, he found a fairy ring made of birch trees and synced through the veil to the human world. It was as instinctual as flying with the beautiful blue and black wings he had that almost seemed to glow.

The first thing he noticed was that the air seemed thinner. Some strange quality of silver hung between the trees, something that Logan couldn’t quite place. It was unsettling. He wasn’t sure he really wanted to be here, but he was here now, and he had learning to do. He flapped his wings and started flying low to the ground, all the way out of the forest and into the human village.

Everything was so  _ big _ . He had known it would be, but he hadn’t been prepared for it. And the humans he saw looked so clumsy. They trod on the grass with feet several times longer than Logan’s entire body, and he watched with wonder as a few smaller humans came traipsing towards the vegetable garden that Logan was currently perched in. He was hiding behind the large leaves of a squash plant, so he was pretty sure that he was safe.

He didn’t expect one of the children’s eyes to alight on him and widen in shock, a huge hand shooting out and grabbing him.

Logan screamed. The child’s hand was crushing him, he couldn’t breathe, he was going to die--

“Look at this!” the child exclaimed, holding Logan up for her friends to see. Her hand opened for just a second, and if Logan had been able to breathe, he would have flown away right then. But then he felt her fingers pinch one of his wings and she picked him up by it and it  _ hurt _ , it felt like his wing was going to be torn off.

“What is it?” a little boy asked. “Is it a bug.”

Logan tried not to scream again. It hurt so much.

“No! It has a face! And tiny clothes!”

“But it has butterfly wings! It must be a weird butterfly!”

“No,” the girl holding Logan said. “It’s a fairy.”

“It looks like it’s just a baby,” one of the other kids said doubtfully. Their voices were too loud. Logan felt like his head was going to explode from all the noise. “I don’t know, I think you should let it go.”

_ Let me go! Let me go! _

“Nuh-uh! I’m gonna keep it!”

_ Please let me go! _

“You better hide it,” the little boy said. “If my friends see it, they’d squish it and pull it apart for fun.”

The girl who had captured Logan gasped. “No! I’ll hide it in a jar and put it in my drawer and nobody will ever find it! Promise not to tell?”

“I promise,” the other two chorused.

Logan felt his wing being released. He was dropped back into the palm of the girl, and her other hand closed on top of him, shutting him into the darkness. He curled up into a ball, terrified. Everyone had been right. He shouldn’t have come to the human world, but at least he understood it now.

It was terrible. Everything about it was awful. He knew those weren’t objective observations, but they were the truth. As he was dropped into a glass jar with a few leaves at the bottom, the lid screwed on tightly, he remained curled up and didn’t move at all.

“I think it’s dead,” one of the children said.

“Maybe it’s just sleeping?”

“It needs airholes, or it won’t be able to breathe.”

The sound of a pin poking through the lid made Logan cover his ears with a whimper.

“It’s alive! See, it moved!”

“What are you gonna feed it?”

“I don’t know, fruit or something. I’m sure it’ll eat whatever I give it if it’s hungry enough. It’s my pet now.” The jar was placed into a drawer, which closed, plunging Logan into total darkness. The voices continued, muffled. “Come on, let’s go see if we can find some berries to pick down the hill.”

And then there was silence. Logan slowly uncurled. He walked in a circle around the base of the jar, feeling the smooth glass walls with his hands and tripping over the leaves. He flapped his wings experimentally and, before he knew it, had slammed his head into the lid. Letting out a cry of pain, he plummeted back down and landed on his stomach. He couldn’t breathe, his wing still hurt from the child pulling on it, and he was starting to cry. “I want to go home,” he whispered, knowing nobody could hear him. Why hadn’t he listened to Emile or his parents? “I wanna go home!”

His captor would occasionally shove bits of food into the jar, and she dripped water in through the air holes. “It’s raining, Blue!”

But mostly, the days and weeks passed in the darkness of the jar and the drawer. Logan kept count of the days. He had always been very good at counting and keeping numbers in his head. Ten days passed, then thirty, and before he knew it, he had been trapped in the jar for a hundred days.

Around that time, he could barely move his wings anymore. Without being able to fly, the muscles that controlled them had weakened. It was around that time when he stopped crying, too. It hadn’t gotten him anywhere before, so there was no point in it continuing. Whenever he found himself wondering if Emile or his parents were looking for him, he pushed the thoughts away. Sitting alone in the dark, he learned not to feel anything. It made it easier. No more pain. No more loneliness. No more fear.

He sat there as the days changed from one hundred forty one to one hundred forty two, and he realized that he had just turned seven years old.

The girl would sometimes leave him out on the table in her bedroom, telling him, “It’s a reward! You can look around today.”

He hadn’t done anything to deserve a reward, but then, he hadn’t done anything to deserve punishment either.

Two hundred eleven. Logan stopped eating for a few days. He wanted to die. It was the only way he could ever escape the jar. But the hunger pains got the better of him and he ate the bread crumbs that the girl dropped into the jar, hating himself for not having the strength to die.

At least he would disintegrate after a year. Every fairy had been told that a thousand times before they could even fly.  _ If you stay in the human world for a year, you’ll disintegrate, and you’ll be lost forever. _ He didn’t have too far to go now. Two hundred eighty days.

Two hundred ninety, and Logan tried to fly. He got a few inches into the air before he collapsed, aching all over. He tried every single day for ten days, and then gave up.

Three hundred. Not far to go now.

Three hundred twenty, and Logan started to feel like he was going to fall apart any day now. He trembled continuously and uncontrollably. He could barely eat. His skin began to turn an ashy grey color.  _ Finally _ , he thought.  _ Finally. _

The girl became concerned. “You look sick, Blue,” she said. “I’ll leave you out of the drawer. Maybe you just need some sunlight.”

The sunlight hurt his skin and his eyes. He curled up underneath a scrap of fabric that she had put in the jar, and waited for death.

Three hundred forty eight. The girl had left the jar on the table again, and had gone out to play with her friends. She didn’t return that night, which wasn't unusual. Logan coughed for hours, barely able to breathe. His vision was blurry, and he kept hearing things he knew couldn’t be there.

Someone was calling his name. “Logan! Logan!”

Logan’s tired, sick mind didn’t recognize the figure that was standing on the table next to the jar. But the large brown and pink and purple wings reminded him of something, and he gazed at them. They made him feel safe for the first time since he had entered the human world.

“Logan, I’m going to get you out of there!”

Strange, that this figment of his mind would say such a thing. Especially since there was no way out of the jar. Logan knew, because he had tried hundreds of times before he had given up.

“Logan, say something, please. Tell me you know who I am. Look at me, little one, look at me. It’s me. It’s Emile. I finally found you.”

Suddenly, Logan’s eyesight sharpened, and the face of his cousin fell into focus. “E-Em…?” he whispered, his voice hoarse from illness and disuse.

“I’m going to save you,” Emile told him. “I’m going to save you, I promise.” He put his hands on the outside of the glass jar. “I’m here now, little one.”

Logan let his head fall back down with a sigh. His eyes closed.

“No!” Emile cried. “Logan, stay with me. Stay with me. I’m going to bring you back to the fairy world, and I’m going to take care of you, but you need to stay with me.”

Logan heard him as if he spoke from a great distance. “So tired,” he breathed.

“I know, I know. I can’t...I can’t open this, Logan, I can’t open the lid.” Emile sounded horrified. “Little one, how long have you been in there?”

“Three hundred...forty nine days.”

“Oh, little one…” Emile murmured. “I’m going to have to push it off the table, and it’ll shatter. I can do it, I...I’m just strong enough to move it.” Sure enough, the jar started to inch across the wooden tabletop. “Logan, I need you to flap your wings. I need you to fly.”

“Can’t…”

“I need you to try! If you’re flying inside the jar when it hits the ground, you won’t be injured as much by the impact. Please, just try,” Emile pleaded.

For Emile, he could try. Logan sat up, shaking with effort, and flapped his wings weakly. Once, twice. He barely heard his cousin's encouragement and praise, straining as he felt himself lifting off the ground.

Then the jar plummeted off the edge of the table and shattered against the floor with the loudest sound that Logan had ever heard. His body burned with agony, he couldn't hear anything but the echoes of the crash, and he hardly felt his cousin's arms underneath him as he was scooped up gently and cradled against Emile’s chest. The soft beating of Emile’s large wings lifted them both up into the air. That was when Logan lost consciousness.

He opened his eyes again to see treetops above him. Something had changed. The air felt golden here, and there was no longer the strange, uncomfortable feeling deep inside him that told him he was in the wrong place. Was it possible? Could he be home?

Emile glanced down at him. “There you are,” he murmured. “We're almost home, Logan, you can close your eyes and rest. I've got you.”

But now that he was awake, he was aware of the stabbing pain in his wrist and the warm, dampness of his tattered tunic coupled with a slicing agony in his torso. He was bleeding. There were more places he was bleeding from on his legs, too.  _ Shattered glass _ , he thought, but knowing the cause didn't make it hurt any less. He whimpered loudly, trying to go back to the numbness that he had managed to achieve in the jar.  _ Don't feel anything. _ It didn't work.

“You're going to be alright,” Emile said softly. “I'm a healer, Logan, I was in training before you disappeared, you know that. And I'm fully qualified now. You're going to be alright. I'll make it stop hurting as soon as I can. Try to close your eyes now. We're almost home.”

“Are…” Logan's voice wavered. He barely had the energy to speak. “Mother and Father, are they going to be there?”

An upset look crossed Emile’s face. “I'm so sorry, little one. But they're not.”

Logan could feel the pain and exhaustion pulling him back down into unconsciousness.

He awoke to more pain. His wrist was on fire, his whole body ached, the gashes on his abdomen and legs from the glass were stinging and burning, and he let out a wail before he was even fully awake. Immediately, a soothing voice was shushing him and telling him to breathe. “You're alright, you're alright,” Emile said.

“Falsehood,” Logan sobbed. He screamed as the pain in his wrist sharpened even more. Oh, why couldn't he go back to not feeling anything?

“You're  _ going  _ to be alright,” Emile amended. “Shhh, breathe, breathe. Follow my breathing, little one, listen to me. Breathe in.” Emile’s hand brushed through Logan's hair as the boy laid there and cried for the first time in over two hundred days. “Breathe out. Hold my hand, Logan, as tightly as you can.”

Logan didn't have the strength to grip very hard, but he tried. After a minute, he felt Emile lift his head up slightly. “What…?” he mumbled.

“Drink this, little one. It will help with the pain.” A warm, sharp and sweet tasting liquid was dripped into his mouth and he swallowed reflexively. Almost immediately, the warmth spread through his whole body and the pain began to ease enough for him to breathe normally. It was still nearly unbearable, but not completely. “Take a little more, Logan, and then I have to keep tending to your wounds.”

Logan swallowed the next sip eagerly, and the pain dulled even further. A gentle hand wiped away the tears from his cheek and then trailed down his neck to his chest and stomach, circling one of the areas where he could feel the stabbing pain of where the glass from his broken prison had pierced his skin.

“These are pretty bad, Logan. Luckily, none of them are so deep that you have many internal injuries, but they do need to be sewn shut, because you're losing a lot of blood. I have you propped up on pillows that are putting pressure on the ones on your back, so we're starting here. The reason I'm telling you this is because it's going to hurt, even with the medicine I gave you. So take a deep breath and be brave, little one.”

No amount of bravery would have stopped the young fairy from whimpering and shrinking away from the needle and spider silk thread in his cousin's hand.

Emile paused. “I know you're afraid,” he murmured. “I don't know exactly what is going on in your head after what you've been through, but whatever it is, know that you are safe now. And I'm going to help you through it. But first I need to make sure that you aren't going to bleed to death, so hold still.”

Logan held still, but he couldn't hold back the tears from spilling out as his cousin stitched up the wounds on his front. His wrist was already in a splint, but Emile wrapped it up even tighter to keep it completely immobile. When it was time for Emile to stitch the wounds on his back, he actually picked Logan up, sat down on the floor with him, and held him in his lap. He kept speaking softly the whole time, telling Logan stories, even after all the stitches had been finished and the wounds bandaged. Logan didn't have the strength to do anything other than cling to him and listen.

“It's not going to be a short or easy path to recovery,” Emile told him. “Your body nearly lost its integrity in the human world, and though being back here has stopped the progression of the illness, it has not reversed it. It'll take time, but I know we can get through it. You and me.”

“Where are Mother and Father?” Logan asked. The words came out as breathy whispers.

Emile shushed him and held him closer.

“Please,” Logan begged. “I want to know."

“They...they left, Logan,” Emile told him reluctantly. “They left the forest a few months after you disappeared. They...didn't think you were still alive. I don't know where they went, and I haven't been able to find them. Believe me, I've tried.” He stroked Logan's hair, which had grown far too long in his captivity. “But I never gave up on you. I knew I'd find you eventually.”

There was a horrible, wrenching feeling inside Logan's chest. For a second, he wondered if he was dying. And then he started to sob, and the feeling inside him began to relent. The fact that his parents had given up and left him for dead didn't really surprise him. But that didn't mean it didn't hurt.

“There, shhh, little one,” Emile murmured. “I'm here. I'm going to take care of you. You just let everything out, goodness knows you have the right to cry.”

And cry he did. With his face buried in Emile’s light brown sweater, Logan cried until he didn't even have the energy to keep crying, and then he went limp, shudders spasming through his exhausted body. Emile held him until the shuddering stopped, then lifted him up and deposited him down gently onto a soft bed. Logan curled up on his side, his wings laying flat behind him. He gazed around with eyes still filmed over with tears. “Where are we?” he whispered. The walls were rounded, and there was a table and stools to sit on. A dark pink rug covered the floor.

“This is my home, Logan. It's inside a tree hollow. There's the door, see?” Emile pointed at a light purple curtain covering a hole in the wall. “But try to close your eyes, little one. You need rest.” His hand came down to touch Logan’s eyelids lightly, making them close. Logan was asleep in seconds.

The walls were closing in around him. He screamed, thrashing around on the bed and ignoring the immediate agony from his injuries. He couldn’t breathe in here.

Emile, who had seemingly fallen asleep sitting up next to him, awoke with a start. “Logan!” he exclaimed. “Logan, be still, be still!” He tried to hold Logan still, but Logan wasn’t having it.

“I can’t breathe,” he gasped. “I can’t breathe!”

“Yes, you can--yes, yes, you can, Logan. What are you afraid of?”

Logan stared around the room with wild eyes. It was too small, he was trapped, there wasn’t enough air.

“Did you have a nightmare?” Emile asked.

Shaking his head, Logan tried to gesture around at the walls. He had moved with his left arm, though, forgetting the splint on his wrist. The broken bone was jarred by the movement and he screamed again.

“Logan! Logan, stop moving!” Emile picked him up, cradling the small fairy like a baby. “You’re alright, you’re safe.”

“Can’t breathe in here,” Logan insisted. “Trapped, I’m trapped--”

Emile finally understood. “We’ll go outside,” he said, carrying Logan towards the curtain covering the door. “Let’s go outside and get some fresh air, alright?”

Logan nodded, whimpering. As soon as Emile stepped outside onto one of the branches of the tree, Logan could feel his heartbeat start to slow. The air was cold, but he could breathe now. Emile flapped his wings and carried Logan up to the very top of the tree, sitting on a twig there and holding the child in his lap.

“Look up,” he whispered to Logan. “Look up, see? I know you like the stars.”

He did like the stars. He had memorized all of their placements and how they moved throughout the year, and he knew the names of all the ones that had names. In the early days of his imprisonment, he would say all the names to himself, wishing that he could see them again. He looked up now and saw them, the bright dots across the dark sky. His mouth opened in wonder as he remembered suddenly how much he had loved looking at them.

Emile breathed a sigh of relief as the boy calmed down. “Logan,” he said softly. “There’s something I want you to remember. The stars are always up there, even when you can’t see them. Even during the day, or when the moon is too bright, or if you’re inside. They’re still there, watching over you.” He stroked his young cousin’s hair. “And if you can remember that, you’re always going to be alright.”

Logan heard him, but he didn’t respond. He was too busy staring up at the stars.

Every day for a week, Emile had to carry him outside multiple times when he started to feel trapped. Logan could barely walk on his own. He could take a few steps, but then would crumple to the ground, shaking and in pain. Every time, Emile would gather him close and tell him that he was doing a great job, that he was getting so much stronger. Logan knew he was lying, but the encouragement still made him feel better.

Or perhaps he wasn’t lying, because as Logan’s injuries started to heal and his body recovered from the long imprisonment in the human world, he was able to walk again and even fly for short distances. The periods of terror and claustrophobia went from several times a day to once every few days, and he could usually get out of it himself without needing Emile to hold him or bring him outside.

He learned how to control the volatile emotions, with Emile coaching him on how to accept feelings without making himself numb. Emile was good at that. He was a healer, but he knew how to heal both body and mind, unlike most healers who only ever focused on the body. Because of that, Logan realized, not many people wanted to come to him. His practices were too far out of the norm. But Logan knew that a regular healer would never have been able to help him in the way that he needed.

As Logan regained his strength and could once again fly for longer distances, he started to resume his exploration and self-education. Emile was relieved to see his young cousin’s curious and intelligent personality slowly return, and listened with delight the first time that Logan had come home to spout all his observations about a plant that he had been studying.

When Logan noticed the smile on his cousin’s face, he stopped talking and made a face. “What? Why are you smiling? I don’t think the types of pollinator that come to the flower patch by the hill is funny.”

“No, no,” Emile said quickly. “I’m just glad you’re feeling better, Logan. Please, keep telling about your day.”

So Logan did. Every day that he was feeling well enough to go outside, he would come back and tell Emile everything he had learned. At first, Emile was concerned about letting him run off on his own, but it soon became pretty clear that Logan wasn’t going too far, and he certainly knew better than to go back to the human world.

He still worried, though, and couldn’t help but panic one night when Logan didn’t come home. As soon as the sun set and Logan still hadn’t returned (he always came home before dark,  _ always _ ), Emile set out to search for him. Although he wasn’t a sprite, his rare moth wings gave him better night vision than most fairies. An hour of frantic searching later, and Emile found Logan curled up inside a particularly large purple flower in his favorite spot at the foot of a hill. The boy had fallen sound asleep.

Emile exhaled, the tension and fear leaving him. He picked Logan up, smiling at the way the young fairy clutched at him in his sleep. Logan woke up on the way back to the tree. “Did I fall asleep, Em?” he mumbled.

“You sure did, Lo, and you gave me quite a scare.”

“Sorry,” whispered Logan.

“It’s alright, but be more careful next time. Anything could find you, all exposed like that. You’re lucky it was me,” Emile told him sternly. 

He couldn’t stay angry, however, as Logan blinked sleepily, yawned, and snuggled down in his arms. “Can we sit outside and look at the stars for a while?” he asked.

They had almost reached their tree. Emile changed direction and flew up to the top. “Of course, little one,” he murmured. “We can look at the stars as long as you like.” He sat down on the top branch and placed Logan down next to him.

Logan yawned again and shivered as he leaned against his cousin. He stared up at the night sky. The light of the moon drowned out all but the brightest stars, and he fell asleep watching them before Emile gently carried him inside.

Thirteen years later, when Logan was twenty, he decided that he wanted to become an educator in the city. He wanted to have access to the great libraries and archives, to follow his passion for knowledge and to spread it as much as he could. He was the youngest applicant to the University for the educator program in recorded history, but it turned out that there were technically no rules against his admission and his application was, as one professor put it, “mindblowingly competent”, so away he went.

Even though he knew that Logan would be back every four weeks for a week-long break, Emile felt very alone in his home with his little cousin gone.

But that was nothing compared to when Logan graduated and was immediately handed the position of Palace Educator for the young Prince Roman. He had gotten it partially because of his youth and partially despite it, for though he had no real-world experience, the Queen and King had decided that their somewhat fanciful and obstinate son would benefit from having someone rather younger as his tutor than his previous caretakers now that he was of schooling age. When Logan told Emile the news, and stated that he was leaving most likely for good this time, Emile had to put on a joyful fake smile.

“I’m so proud of you,” Emile said. That much was true, and Logan knew it. Logan let his cousin hug him tightly the morning he had to leave, and promised to visit as often as he could. Then he had left.

From that moment until just after sunset, Emile was fine. He was sad, and a bit lonely, but he felt like he was coping with it alright. Then he pulled aside the purple curtain that covered his door, gazed out at the stars, and burst into tears. He put his hand on the back of his head, trying to calm himself down, and hoped that his cousin was looking up at the stars as well and thinking of him.

He didn’t know it, but that was exactly what Logan was doing as well.


	3. Virgil

Winter was holding the forest in its deepest, iciest clutches. Shards of frost coated every brown blade of grass and icicles dripped from every twig. The river was nearly frozen over, only the very deepest and fastest flowing stretches remaining liquid. It was one of the worst winters that most fairies could recall in living memory, and a lonely little river fairy was stumbling along the ice. His shimmering purple and green dragonfly wings were frosted over at the tips.

The boy was only five years old. He was too young to understand it, but his parents had fallen victim to a blizzard a week ago, and were never going to return to their cozy home underneath the roots of a great elm tree. The boy, whose name was Virgil, had waited there for as long as he could before hunger had driven him outside.

Virgil slipped on the ice and collapsed into a heap, whimpering. Fairies could maintain their internal body temperature much more effectively than most creatures their size, but he was only a child, and he was  _ cold _ .

“Can someone help me?” he called out, his voice piteously thin. It was absorbed in the thick white winter air before anyone could hear it.

A snowflake landed on top of his head, melting into his thick brown hair and soaking it through. He let out a desperate whine, pulling himself to his feet and trudging forward, seeking shelter. Food was far from his mind now as the urgent problem of freezing to death grew ever more pressing.

Finally reaching the sparse shelter of the trees, he curled up underneath a mushroom that had somehow survived the frost. It was dry and slightly warmer than the surrounding area, and Virgil’s violent shivering calmed into occasional shudders. He closed his eyes and fell asleep, exhausted.

He woke up to more snowflakes. They were piling up around him. The forest floor was beginning to get coated in a thin layer of soft white powder, though it was nowhere near a blizzard. He remained under the toadstool for a while, hoping the snow would stop, but the snow was falling faster now. More secure shelter was necessary, and soon.

Virgil crawled through the snow, knowing that if he could just find somewhere dry and covered, he would be able to get warm. Just as he was about to give up, he reached the roots of a scrawny birch tree and tumbled down a hole.

He hit dry dirt with a thud that made him cough, winded. It was dark in this hole, only dimly lit by the faraway sunlight through the opening. He took a few steps backwards, realizing that the hole was bigger than he had thought. The child couldn’t believe his luck. He would be safe in this hole!

A shifting, rustling, scraping sound behind him made him freeze in place. There was a low hiss. And then, before he could move or react, a blinding, stabbing pain shot through his right upper wing. He felt it being pierced through, traces of venom shooting down into his shoulder from the disturbed pit viper’s venom.

Virgil screamed. Faster than he had ever moved before, he darted forward and climbed back up out of the whole, fear making his limbs strong. He glanced back and saw in his peripheral vision, a single glinting yellow eye staring at him through the darkness.

He climbed faster.

Stumbling, dizzy from the venom and his shoulder in agony, Virgil ran away from the tree. He didn’t know how long he ran for before everything turned dark.

His memory from then until the beginning of summer was a complete blank. He woke up in a burrow that was probably made by a mole, his shoulder burning and his wing completely numb. Crawling out into the sunlight, he looked at his damaged wing and gasped. What had once been perfect purples and deep greenish blues across smooth, translucent scales was now crumbling away at the tip. A puncture in the wing was grown over with black scar tissue, and diseased looking green and yellow streaks covered the entirety of the upper wing.

He couldn’t move the wing at all. Any attempt to do so elicited agonizing pain in his shoulder and back. Gasping for air through the pain, the young boy found himself wondering how he was still alive. He didn’t want to think about almost dying. He wanted his parents.

Several fairy families living in the area were shocked to find the orphaned child crawling out of the ground covered in dirt and looking half dead, but they gave him food and shelter and took care of him as well as they could. For the next ten years, Virgil grew up without a real home but never without somewhere to rest his head at night. Nobody could cure his wing, and he never learned how to fly.

Rumors of something dark roaming the forest grew slowly. At first it was only whispers, nothing substantial, someone mentioning that they overheard someone else talking about their friend who had heard a human say that a voice in the forest had led them astray when they had been lost, and they had found themself alone in the darkest groves of trees and had barely escaped alive. But soon, similar stories began cropping up amongst the fairies.

Virgil felt a growing sense of unease. There was something dangerous in the forest. It would whisper sibilant instructions to children while they were off playing, telling them to follow it. Word came about disappearances, fairies vanishing without a trace, never to be seen again. It was all concentrated around the area he had grown up in. A few fairies he knew went missing. There was near widespread panic among the families. They kept their children close. Some of them disappeared anyway.

Filled with protective urges for the ones who had taken care of him when he was younger, Virgil decided to do something about it. He would find whatever evil thing was stalking the woods and deal with it once and for all. He felt sure that he would be able to do it, even when everyone else had failed.

So he set off, wearing dark clothing and looking as lost as he could. “I’ve lost my way,” he called out into the forest. “Can someone help me? Point me in the right direction?”

This continued for hours before he heard it. A soft hissing in the undergrowth, the rustling of scales against leaves. The hair on the back of his neck stood on edge.

“Follow me, little lostling,” a voice whispered. “I know which way it is to safety.”

Virgil turned around and, staring into the bushes, was greeted with the golden, reptilian gaze of a single eye watching him.

He wasn’t proud of what he did next. Filled with icy fear and unable to breathe for the memory of the fang piercing his wing, Virgil ran. He ran and ran until he was at the edge of the river, panting and crying. He knew now, it was all his fault. He had made this deceitful creature that had caused the disappearance of so many innocent fairies.

A non-magical animal that ingested any part of a fairy became sentient. It had been known to happen to wildcats and weasels quick enough to make a meal out of a fairy. The creatures were always intelligent and gained enough of a moral compass to never attack a fairy or other sentient being for food again. They often preferred to keep to themselves, though some had been rumored to befriend fairies and keep company with them.

The pit viper that had bitten Virgil all those years ago must not have ingested enough of his wing to make a full transition to a sentient, moral being. Intelligent enough to lie but with only enough morality for self-preservation, the snake was hunting for food and defending its territory the way it knew how.

“I put them all in danger,” Virgil whispered to himself, kneeling at the bank of the river. “My fault.”

He tried to explain to everyone what had happened, but they didn't believe him. Such a creature had never been heard of. A partially sentient animal was unprecedented.

Not only that,but the disappearances had suddenly stopped. When Virgil went looking for the snake again, he couldn't find it.  _ Where could it have gone? _ he lamented to himself after another day of searching.

After months without another disappearance or sighting of the snake, the local fairies began to think that Virgil was crazy for still searching. “The trauma of losing his parents so young is finally catching up to him,” they said.

Then word came to Virgil of a disappearance in another part of the forest. The snake was moving, and Virgil had to follow it.

He tracked the snake for years, across vast stretches of faraway forests and valleys, never catching up to it or having another sighting. He didn't know what he would do if he ever did find it, but he had to get rid of it. The snake had already killed too many fairies, and it was his fault. He was going to end it, someday. Somehow.


	4. Patton

A deafening crash echoed through the small house, followed by angry shouting. “I leave you alone for ten minutes, and this is what I come back to? You're worse than useless!”

“I'm sorry, I'm sorry!”

“You will be!”

Patton shrank back into the corner where he had fallen to his knees to duck and avoid the pot that had been flung at his head. It had hit the wall instead. Some of the hot, burnt contents that had once been stew but was now mostly just a charred mess splashed out of the pot and hit him, scalding his skin. He tried not to scream in pain, but couldn't bite back a whimper.

“You're crying?” his mother shouted. “Stop that, or I'll give you something to cry  _ about _ !”

“I'm sorry,” Patton repeated desperately. “I'm sorry, please, don't--”

His mother grabbed him by the collar and pulled him to his feet before throwing him back down. He felt something inside of him crack on his right side where his ribs struck the hard edge of the brick fireplace. The fire was still going, and Patton tried to get away before he got burned.

_ It hasn't even healed from last time, _ he thought. There was an angry red scar on his arm from boiling water a few weeks ago.

“Get back here,” she snapped, holding onto his forearm and twisting it. He knew from experience that it would bruise in dark purples and yellows the next day. His mother reached up with her hand and Patton closed his eyes quickly as she struck him on the side of his face, her ring cutting through his cheek.

_ Please let it be over, _ he begged whatever deity might be listening.

The gods must have been feeling merciful that day, because his mother dragged him over to the door and threw him outside, saying, “I don't want to see your sniveling, pathetic self back here for at least two days. Make it three if you value the other side of your useless face. Get out of my sight!”

Patton scrambled to his feet and ran, pressing his hand to his cheek to stop the bleeding.  _ Don't cry, don't cry, don't cry, _ he chanted silently.  _ Make it to the forest, then you can cry, find Tom, and then you can cry, when we're safe. _

The edge of the forest loomed up and Patton burst through the trees, heading straight for the tiny wooden shelter he had built for Tom.

“Tom!” he called. His voice sounded high and reedy. “Tom, come here, boy!”

He made it to the clearing where the shelter was, and he almost sobbed with happiness when he saw the small puppy wobbling out of the opening in the side of the little wooden hut. Patton dropped to the ground and held out his arms.

Making a few high-pitched barks that were closer to whimpers, Tom leapt into Patton’s arms. His brown fur was soft, his too-big ears floppy and silky. The puppy had been given to him a month ago by a neighbor whose dog had given birth to a litter of six. Patton hadn't even told his mother, just taken Tom to the forest, built him a house, and visited him at least once a day to give him food and make sure he was safe.

Tom nudged his little wet nose against Patton's cheek, still whining. He licked the cut gently like he was trying to help.

Patton buried his face in the puppy’s fur and burst into tears. “Thank you, Tom,” he said. “I--I appreciate it, I really do, but you can't fix it, sorry. I love you, kiddo, but you c-can't make it better.”

As if to say  _ I can try _ , Tom licked Patton's cheek again, and then began swiping his tongue over every part of Patton's skin that he could reach. Patton managed to smile.

“Thanks for the kisses, puppy,” he said. “You're a sweetie, I love you.” He looked up, noticing how dark it was getting. He could feel the prickle of fear that always accompanied night in the forest, and did his best to push it away, pretending that it wasn't him who was afraid. Patton petted the puppy’s head gently. “We're safe together, Tom. Don't be scared."

The puppy didn't look worried. He just snuggled closer to Patton.

“You're right, we should get out of the open, though.” Patton crawled over to the shelter and squeezed through the opening. He was just skinny enough to fit, and just small enough to curl up inside it with Tom cradled against his chest.

Ignoring the sharp ache in his side and the searing pain where the burnt stew had hit his flesh, Patton closed his eyes.

_ Lucky it's summer, _ he thought sleepily.  _ It's so much worse in the winter. And at least I have Tom now. _

Those thoughts comforted him enough to let him fall asleep.

The morning came, and Patton woke up feeling extremely claustrophobic inside the shelter. He slid outside as quickly as he could, breathing fast. Tom was already waiting out there, lying in the dew-covered grass with his paws over his nose. He sprang to his feet when he saw Patton and barked happily, running in circles around the human's feet.

“Okay, okay,” Patton laughed. “Good morning to you, too!” He picked the puppy up. “We've got to go find food, kiddo. I left a bit of bread in a bag hanging from a tree down the path last week, but  _ you _ don't want bread, and I don't want to just eat stale bread for the next three days, so let's go fishing. And there might be some strawberries in that one patch by the stream, wouldn't that be very nice?”

He took a few steps into the trees.

“ _ Berry _ nice,” he added suddenly, stopping to giggle at his own joke. Tom licked his nose.

At the stream, Patton rested his arms in the cool water to try and soothe the still stinging burns. It helped, marginally. Tom was amusing himself by chasing frogs in the shallow ripples.

“Don't suppose you could make yourself useful and catch a fish instead,” Patton said off-handedly. Then he gasped and rushed over to the puppy, picking him up, hugging him, and saying, “No, I'm sorry, I didn't mean it, you're useful just how you are, kiddo! I'm sorry! You don't have to catch fish, I still love you!”

Tom yipped and squirmed, not understanding why Patton had stopped his fun. Patton put him down.

“Go chase your frogs,” he murmured. “I'll take care of the fish.”

The puppy bounded off again after the hapless amphibians, sending showers of water spraying everywhere.

Patton wiped his face and set about catching a fish with the small rod and line that he kept in the forest for occasions just like this. He got banished from the house enough that he learned pretty quickly how to be self-sufficient. He had probably been about 8 years old the first time he had been thrown out overnight and told to come back in the morning. He was 15 now, and he wasn't going to stay there much longer.

“As soon as I have enough coins saved up bribe a merchant to take me with them, we'll be out of here, Tom,” Patton said. He had caught a fish and was now cooking it over a small fire that he had built.

Tom came sniffing at it curiously, and Patton threw his arm out protectively.

“No, stay away from the fire, it's dangerous!” he scolded. “I don't want you getting hurt, Tom. I gave you the first fish, this one is mine.”

If a dog could pout, Tom was pouting. He flopped down in a patch of clovers in the sunlight, looking almost cat-like.

“Good boy,” Patton said. “I'm really hungry, Tom, or I'd let you have this one too. Sorry.” Patton's stomach growled, confirming his statement. He hadn't eaten anything yesterday except for a bite of carrot that he didn't put in the stew. While he ate, he kept talking out loud. “And once we find somewhere to live, far, far away from here and anyone who wants to hurt us, we'll find all of the children who are scared and lonely and we'll give them a home, right, Tom? And I'll be their dad who doesn't leave for months to go on merchant trips. And they'll never have to worry about someone hitting them or burning them or yelling at them.”

Tom barked in response, tilting his little head at Patton and blinking his brown eyes.

Patton nodded. “Uh-huh, that's right, and they'll all love you. ‘Cause you're the best dog. And if they want a dog of their own, they'll never have to be afraid to ask me for one. And we'll all live in a great big house with a garden, and none of us will ever have to be lonely again.”

After Patton put out the fire and walked downstream to the strawberry patch, he sat on a log with a handful of the bright red fruits.

“It won't be long now,” he said, munching them. “I have eight coins hidden near your house, and I can probably convince someone to take me with them for ten. Of course, I'd want a little bit more to keep us going. Maybe fifteen. And if I keep sneaking out at night to do chores for the neighbors, it'll only be a couple more months until we have enough.” He yawned suddenly. His belly was full for the first time in days, and it was making him sleepy. Rubbing his eyes, he walked over to where Tom had made himself comfortable in a dry patch of dirt and grass warm from the sun. “Nice spot for a nap?” he asked. “I think I'll join you.”

Patton settled down on the ground, curling up on the side that hadn't been injured last night. He dropped off to sleep without noticing the wide ring of toadstools around him. And he was too deeply asleep to see the two fairies that peeked up over one of the mushrooms, one whispering excitedly and the other gazing on with tired exasperation. Neither he nor Tom felt their bodies begin to shrink as the fairies flew in a circle around them, pulling them fully into the fairy world.


	5. Through the Fairy Ring

“Lo, we did it!”

“I am aware, Prince. Have you given thought as to how this human and his animal might react when they wake up?”

“I'm sure it'll be fine.”

Patton blinked. The first thing that he noticed was that the sparse grass that he had laid down in had gotten...a  _ lot _ bigger. As he rolled over onto his back, he saw someone standing over him and looking down with a bright smile on his face. Then Patton saw his wings, and screamed.

The scream woke Tom, who took one look at the suddenly huge world around him and jumped into Patton's lap, trembling and whimpering.

The winged boy, clad in a regal white tunic with a wide red sash, a golden circlet with a ruby in the center upon his reddish-brown hair, looked upset now. “No, why are you afraid? It's alright, we won't hurt you, we only want to keep you for a few days!”

“They are not fireflies to keep in a jar, Prince,” the second voice intoned.

Patton turned his head to stare in fright at a second winged figure. “Wh-wh-who, wh-what, what's going on?” he stammered. “Wh-why am I...tiny? Why do you have w-wings?”

The one called Prince held out a hand. “It's alright!” he said eagerly. “I'm Prince Roman, and you're a human! I need you for my ceremony, it's for good luck.”

Patton’s lip quivered. “What?” he said faintly.

“You're overwhelming him,” chastised the second person. He was taller than the Prince, and looked slightly older. He wore a black tunic and pants, and there was a dark blue strip of cloth tied around his neck. “What are you called, young human?”

“Uh, uh, uh, P-Patton?” he managed. “And my p-puppy is Tom--sorry, are you fairies?”

“Yes,” the black and blue clad fairy stated. “And if you are amenable to the idea, we would like to take you to the palace with us, because Prince Roman has become fixated on the ridiculous superstition that a human present at a coming-of-age ceremony provides ‘good luck’.”

“Oh,” Patton said weakly. “And why am I so small?”

“We've synced you into the fairy world and made you small because otherwise you wouldn't fit in the palace!” Prince Roman exclaimed. “But I've had quarters prepared for you and everything, and--of course you don't  _ have _ to if you don't want to, we'll make you back to your normal size and let you go back home whenever you want, but please come with me to the palace, please, I really want a human at my ceremony and you're the only one I've found!” The boy’s bright eyes sparkled at Patton hopefully.

Patton didn't know what to say. Should he start with  _ fairies are real?! _ Or maybe  _ please take me with you and don't make me go back, I never want to go back. _ Instead of saying anything, he started to cry.

“Oh, for the...I'm not equipped to handle this,” the blue fairy sighed. “He's your responsibility, Prince, I want nothing more to do with it.”

The Prince knelt down next to Patton and patted his shoulder clumsily. “Why are you crying? We aren't going to hurt you.”

Tom seemed concerned by Patton’s tears and licked them away, growling at the Prince.

Prince Roman squeaked and jumped back. “Is it going to bite me?!”

Patton sniffed. “No, he's just protective. He knows when I'm upset.”

“Why are you upset? You're in the presence of fairy royalty!” Roman proclaimed. “You should be honored to attend the ceremony!”

“I'll go,” Patton found himself saying as he wiped away his tears.  _ Even if this is a dream, I'd love to see a fairy palace. _ And it did almost feel like a dream. It was like the world had shifted ever so slightly, and the air was different here. It was clearer, almost. And there was something close to a haze around everything that softened the colors of the world and made them warmer, more magical. “But I can't leave Tom!”

“I suppose you can bring your animal,” the blue fairy said. “If you can keep it under control.”

“Oh, Tom isn't any trouble! He's the best,” Patton promised.

Roman wrinkled his nose. “What  _ is _ it?”

“He's a puppy,” Patton said. “A young dog. Don't you know what a dog is?”

“We do not have human-bred animals in the fairy world,” said the blue fairy disdainfully.

“Well, Tom is part beagle. And part...alright, I'm not  _ entirely _ sure. But he's small and brown and sweet, and that's all that matters,” Patton said in defense of his pet.

“I have a water dragon,” Roman offered. “She's called Bubbles.”

“Dragon?”

The blue fairy sighed again. He seemed to do that a lot. “Prince, we should not linger here any longer. If...Patton, was it?”

“That's my name, don't wear it out,” Patton mumbled.

“I...don’t see how it is possible to wear out a name,” said the blue fairy blankly. “But in any case, Patton, if you are willing to return with us to the palace, we should begin the journey back immediately.” He looked around almost nervously. “There are things in this forest that cannot be trusted. It is safer at the palace.”

“I would love to see the palace,” Patton said honestly. “I'm not very fond of the human world, anyway. This is...this isn't a dream, is it?”

“No, it is not a dream. Hold onto your pet, and we will take care of the rest.” The blue fairy held a hand out to help Patton to his feet.

“What is your name?” Patton asked.

“My name is Logan.” Logan unfolded his wings for the first time and turned towards the Prince, starting to say something.

“Oh!” Patton couldn't help exclaiming at the sight of the mesmerizing blue spots on Logan's otherwise plain black wings. They almost seemed to glow, and Patton stared at them. They were beautiful. He was tempted to reach out and touch them, but restrained himself.

Muttering something under his breath, Logan snapped his wings back shut. The breeze hit Patton in the face, and he stepped backwards. “Prince,” Logan continued as if nothing had happened. “Can you carry the human, or would you like my assistance?”

“I can carry him!” Prince Roman said eagerly. Boasting, he added to Patton, “I'm  _ very _ strong.”

“I'm sure you are,” Patton said kindly. He liked this strange Prince and his swaggering mannerisms. Part of him was flattered and glowing with pride because  _ the fairies wanted him, the fairies thought he would bring good luck and they sought him out and they wanted him. _ The other part of him knew that they didn't care who he was, they just wanted a human and he was convenient. But still, they thought he had some intrinsic worth, and that made his heart swell. “How far is it to the palace?” he asked.

The Prince scooped Patton up into his arms easily. “Not too far. I can get us there in less than an hour.”

Trying not to wince or make any sounds of pain as the ache in his side sharpened and the older burn on his arm was pressed against the Prince’s chest, Patton said, “Alright!” He held Tom tightly with one arm and draped the other around the Prince’s neck, hoping that he wouldn't fall.

He barely noticed when Prince Roman's feet left the ground. The gentle flapping of his wings lifted them both up above the grass and wildflowers. Patton felt a swoop in his stomach as he realized exactly how  _ small _ he was now, and how big the trees seemed when he was only seven inches tall. Tom seemed to have noticed the same thing and was hiding his face in Patton’s chest.

Logan was flying right behind Patton and the Prince. His wingbeats were slower and more measured than the Prince’s, who had much more exuberance and was bouncing up and down in the air. Patton was surprised that it wasn't making him feel sick--he had always gotten nauseous when he rode in a cart or wagon, and this was just as jolting.

“Are you alright?” the Prince asked. “I won't drop you, I promise.”

“I'm fine,” Patton assured him. He tilted his head back and looked up at the Prince, who gave him a dazzling smile. “You know, I didn't even know that fairies were real until today. I was always told that they were just, well, fairy tales.”

“We are most certainly real,” Logan said. “And you are taking this sudden shift in your perception of the world remarkably calmly.”

“Well, uh…” Patton shrugged. “I guess I had always kind of  _ hoped _ that fairies were real, because...I thought there had to be something better than humans.”

“Is the human world that awful?” the Prince asked. “But there are glorious battles and knights in shining armor!”

“Not for me,” Patton said quietly. He turned his gaze up to the branches that whooshed past overhead, small patches of bright blue sky visible through the treetops. He said nothing else for a while.

As they flew through the trees, Patton began to notice little houses, among the branches and on the ground, and the faces of fairies poked out to gaze up at the Prince, Logan, and Patton in what seemed like wonder. Roman waved to a few of them, nearly dropping Patton in the process.

“Oh, I'm sorry!” he exclaimed. “I won't let you fall, really, I promise.”

“I'm okay.” Patton had tightened his grip around Roman’s neck, though, and didn't let go. “I don't know why I never noticed all the fairy houses before! I've spent so much time in the forest, how could I have missed them?”

“They do not exist in the human realm,” Logan said. “Fairies and humans dwell on two separate layers of reality, and a veil between the layers separates them. The only places where the veil is thin enough to cross between are in the liminal spaces contained in naturally formed perfect circles. Fairy rings, if you wish.”

“So...if a fairy went out of the forest and to my village…” Patton said slowly.

“Unless we changed sync through a ring to enter your world, your village would be non-existent for us,” explained Logan.

“Two layers of reality,” Patton repeated. “I'm not sure I understand.”

“It really makes perfect sense. The layers occupy exactly the same space, but are out of sync with each other just enough that each one is invisible to the other.” The way Logan said it made it seem completely matter-of-fact.

Patton still wasn't quite sure he understood it, and the Prince seemed to know it. “Logan, you're just confusing him,” he said. “Don't worry, human, he talks like that all the time. I've learned to tune him out.”

“Young Prince,” Logan said sternly, “I am your tutor and future advisor. Your ability to, as you say, ‘tune me out’ is  _ not _ an asset.”

“Like I was saying,” Prince Roman continued, completely ignoring the blue fairy, “It's alright that you're confused. We're only keeping you for a couple of days, you don't have to try to understand everything about our world.”

Patton caught a glimpse of a couple of tiny children with the wings of a ladybird beetle, clinging to a strand of ivy and gaping open-mouthed at Prince Roman. “Do they recognize you?” he asked curiously. “Everyone seems to be staring.”

“Oh, they know who I am. The crown would give it away even if my clothes and wings didn't. Not that everyone with wings like mine are part of the royal family.” The Prince's voice grew bitter for a second before he turned it back to cheerful. “It's lovely! Everyone wants to look at me and meet me and talk to me, but they're mostly too nervous. After all, I am going to be their King one day when my mother steps down.”

The fairy houses grew more concentrated as they flew further. There were large clusters of them here and there in what seemed to be towns. Patton saw a few more fairies flying, but they all changed direction as soon as they saw Prince Roman to stay out of his way. “Are we getting near the palace?” Patton wondered.

“Yes, you'll be able to see the city soon. We have to go up to the top of this hill, and it's right over the peak on the other side,” said Prince Roman. “It's beautiful, you'll love it!”

Clutching Tom tighter in anticipation and slight nervousness, Patton watched as they flew up the side of the hill. The trees thinned until the hill was just grass covered, the golden-green strands blowing in the breeze and sparkling in the sunlight. As they cleared the peak and rose up to view the other side, Patton couldn't hold back a gasp.

The city of tiny houses sprawled in concentric semi-circles down the slope outwards from a towering palace. The palace was built in shining layers of multicolored marble, from white to black to gold to pink to blue. It was the most beautiful building he had ever seen, as tall as a tree, with stained glass windows and sweeping balconies and fairies in every color of the rainbow fluttering about.

“Wow,” he breathed. “It's incredible.”

Prince Roman seemed pleased by his reaction. “Wait until you see the inside! We have tapestries and paintings the likes of which you've never seen, and gardens! I'll show you everything! I'll take you to the guest quarters I had prepared for you, and there's clothing for you as well so you don't have to keep wearing this.”

“What's wrong with my sweater?” Patton said indignantly. Sure, it was a little dirty and torn, but he had knitted it himself.

“You just...you won't fit in very well,” the Prince told him. “Trust me.”

“Prince Roman, would you like me to inform the Queen and King of what has transpired?” asked Logan.

“Yes, please! They're very busy today, but I'll take you to meet them tomorrow,” Prince Roman told Patton. They flew in through a wide open window, and the Prince landed lightly on the white marble floor. He set Patton down on his feet, steadying him. “Alright?”

Patton gazed around at the richly colored tapestries. He had never seen artwork so beautiful. Everything was shiny and colorful and spotless and  _ perfect _ , and suddenly, he felt very out of place. A couple of fairies at the end of the hallway, both with bright yellow and black striped wings, were staring at him. He held Tom close and covered up his dirty sweater as best as he could, looking away self-consciously.

Prince Roman seemed to notice. “Come, let’s get you cleaned up!” he said. “The guest quarters are this way.”

He followed the Prince down the wide corridor to a dark wooden door. The Prince opened it and ushered Patton inside the spacious room. A luxuriously large bed surrounded by deep blue curtains sat in one corner, and a wardrobe in another. There was a huge open window that spanned half of one wall, leading to a balcony. Patton could hear running water, and turned his head to see a small, bubbling fountain near the wall.  _ A fountain? Inside? _ he wondered. And then:  _ this whole place is...for me?  _ He placed Tom down on the ground, suddenly afraid that his arms would give out and he would drop the puppy.

“I didn’t know what size the human I found would be, of course, so I just had all sorts of clothes put in here,” Prince Roman was saying as he opened the wardrobe and started pulling clothing out. There were tunics and shirts and dresses of every color of the rainbow. Some were simple, and some were ornate. The Prince handed Patton a few tunics. “Any of these should fit you! There are wing-buttons, of course, but there’ll just be some holes in the back when you’re wearing them.”

Patton touched the soft fabric delicately, afraid he would make it dirty just by putting his hands on it. One of the tunics was pale purple and had small pink gemstones lining the collar and on the buttons that attached the panel in the back to the shoulders--the space between the panel and the rest of the tunic must have been where wings would go. His fingers trembling, he touched one of the sparkling gems on the button and snatched his hand back. The only other gemstone he had ever touched had been the sapphire in his mother’s ring when it would hit his face.

“Well? Do you like any of them?” Prince Roman asked.

Finding his voice, Patton said, “I...I don’t know, I…” He kept looking through the other shirts and found a turquoise one with no gems or frills. It was just plain, but it was a richer dye and brighter color than he had ever worn before. He held it up, looking at the Prince questioningly.

“You want that one?”

Patton nodded.

“You can have it!” declared the Prince. “Here, your pants have tears in them, take these instead.” He held out a pair of light brown pants, plain and simple as well.

“Thank you.” Patton glanced over to make sure that Tom was doing alright. The puppy had found the fountain and was staring at it curiously, his head tilted. He stepped forward, licked at the running water, then jumped back, startled. Slowly, he started creeping up on the fountain again. Patton smiled. He was doing fine.

“Well, are you going to put them on?” the Prince asked.

“Oh! Right, I’m sorry, your...your Majesty? Is that what I should call you? I’m sorry, I don’t know what the right term is,” Patton apologized.

The Prince considered it for a second. “Well, officially, it’s ‘Highness’, not ‘Majesty’ until I’m King. But Logan just calls me Prince, and Remy has all sorts of names for me, and they’re my friends, and...so are you. So I think you can just call me Roman.” He smiled widely. “Friend! I have three now!”

“Roman,” Patton said, trying it out. It sounded a bit disrespectful to just call him by his first name, but if he said it was alright… “Friends?”

“I hope so? I haven’t had many, you know.”

“Me, neither,” admitted Patton. “And I never thought my first friend other than Tom would be a Prince.”

Grinning even more broadly, Roman said, “Well, there we are then! Friends! Now put on your new clothes, I want to take you to the gardens and show you everything!”

Allowing himself a tiny smile, Patton pulled off his dirty grey sweater and glanced around for a place to put it. He decided that everywhere was too clean, and he folded it and put it on the ground. As he took off his undershirt, he heard a gasp.

“You’re injured!” Roman exclaimed. He sounded horrified.

Patton looked down and winced at the sight of the dark red and purple bruising. In his excitement, he had almost forgotten the pain in his rib. “It’s alright,” he tried to assure Roman. “It happens all the time.”

But by that time, Roman had noticed his other injuries--the mottled red burns on his right arm and the bruises on his left. He let out another gasp and rushed over to Patton’s side, examining the marks and touching them gently, like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Patton tried to stay still, but he whimpered in pain when his new friend put pressure on his injured rib. Roman recoiled as if he had been burned. From the expression on his face, he hadn’t seen many injuries before, or had to be around people in pain. “What happened to you?” he whispered. “Did you fight a great battle, like the ones I’ve heard tales about?”

“Not a great battle,” Patton mumbled. “This is just from my mother.”

“Your mother...hurt you?” This seemed to be such a foreign concept to Roman that he couldn’t comprehend it.

“It’s alright, I’m used to it by now. Truly, I’ll be fine. They go away eventually.” Patton reached for the tunic that he had draped over a hook on the wall, intending to cover his injuries back up.

Roman stopped his hand. “I’ll call one of the palace physicians to come and heal you,” he said.

Patton’s eyes widened. “No, it’s really fine!” If he went home with his injuries healed, his mother would know. And she wouldn’t be happy about it.

“But you must be in so much pain!” Roman insisted.

“I’m…” Patton was about to say  _ fine _ , but as he let his guard drop for just a moment, he realized that the pain in his side was making it difficult to breathe and the burns on his arm were in constant agony. Perhaps it was something about being shrunk to fairy size, or being in fairy land itself, but the way that he could usually block out the pain and make himself numb was suddenly gone. Or maybe that was just because someone was showing genuine concern about him for the first time he could remember. He blinked slowly, and nodded. “I’m sorry,” he said softly. “I’m only here to bring you good luck and I’m causing inconvenience. I wish I could be more useful.”

Roman tilted his head. “What do you mean? You are my friend now, and I want to help you. That isn’t an inconvenience.”

Patton felt his lip tremble. There were tears in his eyes before he knew it, and he heard a worried sound from Roman before there was a hand on his back, leading him over towards the bed. “N-no, I’ll get the quilt dirty!”

“I can have someone clean it. Or if that is really upsetting you, you could put on the clean pants? But you should sit down. That’s what Remy tells me when I’m unhappy.”

Taking the pants quickly, refusing to sit on the beautiful cream and blue quilt while there was a chance of getting dirt on it, Patton said, “Wh-who’s Remy?”

“My friend. They’re a sprite.”

Patton put on the clean brown pants, leaving his boots on the floor and then sitting down on the edge of the bed, feeling the soft quilt under his fingers. “They? More than one?”

“No...no, um, sprites aren’t girls or boys. Most pixies aren’t, either. So you call them ‘they’.” Roman sat down next to Patton.

“Oh, okay.” Patton put his face in his hands and tried to take a deep breath. “R-Roman, if I go back home and I don’t have the marks on me, my mother will want to know why. And she’ll be so angry, she’ll think...I don’t know, that I had someone helping me, and I’m not allowed, I’m not allowed to go to anyone else, and she’ll be so mad, I...I think she’d hurt me again, and worse.”

“She hurts you,” Roman stated. “You’re in danger if you go home?”

“I was supposed to stay in the forest for three days and then come back. I can be here for your ceremony and still get home in time, and it’ll be like I was in the forest the whole time, but--” Patton let out a quiet sob. “I don’t want to go home,” he whimpered.

“Well, then, don’t.”

“No, I have to, I have to, because I’m saving the money to run away and I’ll have it in a few months,” Patton tried to explain.

“Why do you need money?”

“To bribe a merchant to take me with him out of town, until I’m far, far away.” Patton felt a nudge at his foot and looked down at Tom. “Tom can’t live in the forest forever, I’m always so afraid that something will happen to him when I’m not there, or if something happens to  _ me _ and I can’t bring him food, then he’ll...he’ll starve. But if I brought him home, m-my m-mother would k-kill him--” Bursting into tears at the thought, Patton reached down and picked the puppy up, hugging him tight.

“She would kill your pet?” Roman said, horrified.

“Sh-she killed the baby s-squirrel I was t-trying to take care of,” Patton wailed. “It w-was just so little and I found it in the forest in a nest and all its siblings were d-dead and I just wanted to save it but m-mother d-drowned it! And she’d drown Tom, too, I just know she would.”

“And she made you sleep in the forest? For days? But it’s so dangerous there, especially for humans. You could have died!” Roman said.

“I learned h-how to take care of m-myself out there.”

“You can’t go back,” Roman said decisively. “You just can’t go back. You’ll have to stay here.”

Patton looked up sharply from where his face was hidden in Tom’s fur. “What?” he uttered.

“Here. Stay here in fairy land.”

Heart pounding, Patton asked, “C-can that happen?”

“My father did it,” Roman said. “My father was a human once, and now he’s a fairy. But you have to turn into a fairy to stay in fairy land, ‘else you’ll disintegrate.”

Patton gasped. “But I’m not a fairy! I’m gonna disintegrate?!”

“It takes about a month!” Roman said quickly. “It’s perfectly safe for a few days. But a human body can’t take the stress of being synced out of their world. Logan told me that the same thing happens if a fairy spends too long in the human world, only for us it takes a year or so. And it’s cue...cumulative. Or something like that. Means that if you spend a month here and go back to the human world and then try to come back to fairy land at any time, you’ll still disintegrate.”

“Then how…?”

“How do you turn into a fairy?” Roman paused. “I...I’m not sure. We don’t talk about it. But I’ll ask Logan. And if he doesn’t know, I’ll ask my father. But it’s possible. You get wings and everything.”

“Wings,” Patton said dreamily. How many times had he fantasized about sprouting wings and flying away from his mother, across the forests and far over the mountains?

He was pulled out of his reverie by a hand brushing lightly against his back. “Yes,” Roman said. “Wings.” The Prince was staring at Patton’s back curiously. “It’s strange, I...I never thought about what someone without wings would look like. It’s just smooth, except I can see your bones sticking out. Is that how most humans look?”

“Ha, um, well. Not if they have enough to eat most of the time.”

“Did you not have food?”

“Not enough. Not usually.” Patton sighed and placed Tom back on the ground. He shivered as Roman’s hand kept tracing over the area where wings would be if he had any.

“Are you hungry now? I can have food brought for you,” Roman offered.

“You’re already doing too much,” protested Patton weakly.

“Nonsense,” the Prince scoffed. “You are my friend and my guest. As long as you are here, you will be treated the same as any of the nobility. It isn’t mealtime, but there is always plenty of extra food in the kitchens. And all of the cooks know and like me, because I sing them songs sometimes. They give me extra cookies, even though Logan says it isn’t good for me.”

“Cookies?” Patton said hopefully. He had only ever had a cookie once. His father had brought one home after a particularly long trip. It had been stale and hard, but it was still the most delicious thing that he had ever tasted.

“Probably right out of the oven.” Roman smiled. “I can go see if I can find some for you if you want? And a physician to take a look at your injuries.”

“I--" Patton broke off sharply. He had been about to say  _ I don't want you to leave _ , but that wasn't something he could ask for. The Prince would laugh at him for presuming too much. “I...I would like that,” he said instead.

“I'll go find someone to send for them! There's always a worker or two in the corridors, I won't have to go far. I'll be right back!” Roman hopped up and went for the door, leaving Patton sitting on the bed.

The slight breeze coming through the open window made Patton shiver. With his torso bare, he got cold pretty easily. Tom was wagging his tail, putting his paws on Patton's leg and whining to be picked up. “Come here, boy,” Patton said, and lifted the puppy into his lap. He winced as Tom bumped the injury on his side, but made sure not to cry out so he didn't scare the dog. “Ah, how about you stay on this side, kiddo?” He scratched the puppy’s ears. Tom's warmth did very little to keep him from shivering, and he wished he could put on the tunic, or his sweater again. If there was going to be a physician looking at him, though, they would probably not want him to be covering his injuries with a shirt.

Just a minute later, Roman came bounding back into the room. “I found a worker and sent them for cookies and a physician! They'll probably bring more food than just cookies, too.” He noticed Patton’s slight trembling. “Oh, are you cold?”

“A-a little, but I'm okay.”

Roman was already going back over to the wardrobe and taking out a blanket that had been folded at the bottom. He draped it around Patton’s shoulders. “Better?”

“It's so soft,” Patton marvelled. The scratchy wool of the blankets at home, which were such an awful texture that he usually prefered to stay cold, felt far, far away from this fluffy fabric. “I’ve never felt anything so soft. It’s like being wrapped in a cloud.”

“Actually, being inside of a cloud isn’t nearly as fun as you might think. It’s kinda just cold and damp and it makes your wings all soggy. Believe me, I tried. Even after Logan told me not to.” Roman laughed. “That’s usually how it goes. He doesn’t think I’m ready to be the King and I keep telling him, that’s fine! I might be coming of age the day after tomorrow, but I still have years and years and years before my mother the Queen will step down for me to take her place.”

Patton was stroking the edge of the blanket with his fingertip. “How old are you?” he asked curiously.

“Seventeen--well, I will be in two days. But fairies only age the same as humans until they are about twenty, and then it slows down. Logan is forty-four.”

“Really?” Patton said incredulously. Logan hadn't looked much older than Roman.

“I know, he's the youngest palace teacher there has ever been,” Roman said. “Most educators don't get their position until they're a hundred or more.”

“A  _ hundred _ ?” Patton exclaimed. “That's so old!”

“Not really? My parents are both almost three hundred.”

Patton coughed, shocked. “That's impossible.”

“Actually, a lot of fairies can get to be over a thousand years old.” Roman grinned, pleased with himself for some reason. “See, that's why I think Logan is silly for wanting me to grow up so quickly. I'm basically just a kid still.”

“I'm fifteen,” Patton offered. “For a human, that's practically grown-up.”

“Really?”

“I think so. At least, nobody treats me like a kid anymore. I guess they never really did.” Patton flinched suddenly as there was a knock at the door.

Roman went over to the door and opened it. “Oh, thank you--no, it’s fine, I can take it.” Someone else was talking, but Patton couldn’t quite make out what they were saying. “Thank you,” Roman said again, and then he closed the door and came back over to the bed carrying a tray covered in a cloth. “They certainly brought more than just cookies, and a physician is on her way.”

Patton’s eyes got very wide as Roman set the tray down on the bed and pulled the cloth cover off. The tray was piled with pastries and fruit. He just stared as Roman sat down on the bed and picked up a small, flaky pastry covered in sugar and ate it. Patton reached towards the tray and then stopped himself.

“I thought you were hungry? Don't you want any?” Roman asked.

He did. He  _ really _ did. But the more he looked at the beautiful plate of food, the more something inside of him was whispering  _ this isn't for you _ .

Roman frowned, sensing his hesitation. He took Patton’s hand and placed a round cookie with small chocolate lumps inside of it onto his palm. “Are all humans this strange? You can have it, it's alright.”

The cookie was still warm. “I didn’t do anything to deserve this,” Patton whispered.

“Um...that’s...that’s okay, you know. You don’t have to...you can just have the cookie. I’m giving it to you, it’s really alright.”

Patton bit into the cookie quickly. It was warm and soft and the chocolate was partially melted, and the stale cookie he ate a few years ago had been  _ nothing _ compared to this.

“You like it?” Roman asked, giggling at the human’s expression.

Patton could only nod, since he had shoved the rest of the cookie into his mouth and would have had a very hard time saying anything.

“Well, you can have more if you want. I mean, you might get a tummy-ache if you try to eat the whole tray, but even if you did manage it, there’s more in the kitchens. They’re preparing all sorts of things for the banquet at my ceremony.”

Patton was realizing that trying to eat the whole thing in one bite might not have been the  _ best _ idea. He wondered if he would be allowed to eat anything at the banquet, or if he was just supposed to stand there and be good luck. Either way, he would be fine. The Prince had already done more than enough already.

The physician that Roman had called came fairly soon. She hid her surprise about being asked to treat a human and began her work, running practiced fingers along Patton's side and mumbling something about a broken rib. Patton tried not to pay attention to how much what she was doing hurt. He ate another cookie as she spread something cool and slightly sticky across his injuries. It stung, and he couldn't help but squirm away with a whimper.

“I'm sorry, dear,” the physician said kindly. “You'll find the pain fading in a few moments, you just have to hold out until then. I'll just bandage you up now.”

Patton watched curiously as she placed a wide swath of white bandage over his side. It stuck to his skin without feeling gross like it had paste on it. “What is that?” he asked, then flinched. Maybe he wasn't supposed to ask questions.

But she didn't seem to mind. “It's spider silk, my dear, the best for patching up wounds.”

With a cry of dismay, Patton tried to get away from her hands. “Spider?” he said, terrified.

“Just its silk! There's nothing to be afraid of, my dear, it's quite safe. And the spiders are humanely farmed as well.” The physician stroked his head reassuringly before continuing to apply the bandages on his side and then onto the burns on his arm.

“Is he going to be alright?” Roman asked her.

“Oh, yes, of course! These injuries are painful, and I can tell that there are plenty of older ones that aren't quite visible anymore that probably cause a lot of aches, but this young human is in no danger. He is nearly starving, however.” The physician, whose wings were brown and gold, tapped Patton’s stomach and ribs to point out how much his bones were sticking out. “But I see that you're already feeding him. Make sure you eat some of the fruit there as well as the sweets, alright, dear?”

Patton nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Just call me Lily, dear. Is there anything else troubling you at the moment?” she asked him.

His pain started to melt away suddenly, taking him by surprise. He let out a sigh of relief. “No, m--Lily, I'm alright. Thank you for helping me.”

There was a gentle smile on her face. “You're welcome, my dear. Alright, well, I'll be going, then. Don't hesitate to send for me if the pain comes back.” She didn't leave through the door but flew out the open window.

Patton watched her go. He must have had a strange expression on his face because after a minute, Roman asked, “Is everything okay?”

“I don't think anyone has ever called me ‘my dear’ before,” Patton whispered.

Roman didn't seem to know how to respond to that. Eventually, he picked up another cookie and handed it to him silently.

Patton ate the cookie and then a few of the raspberry pips that adorned the plate. Each were slightly larger in his hand than a whole raspberry would be if he was human-sized. They were sweeter than any raspberry he had ever had before. He wished he could eat more, but he had eaten the fish and strawberries only a few hours ago (it felt a lifetime away) and his stomach was starting to hurt. He gazed longingly at the rest of the pastries on the tray.

“If you want,” Roman offered, “I can show you around the palace and the gardens now. And we can leave this here in case you get hungry tonight.”

Patton smiled at him shyly. “I'd like that.”

“Well, get dressed, then!” Roman said happily.

Pulling the turquoise tunic on carefully so as not to dislodge the bandages (but realizing quickly that they were very securely attached), Patton asked, “Can Tom come with us?”

“Um...yeah! I don't see why not! Alright, are you ready?” Roman led Patton and Tom to the door. They started to head down the hallway. “I figured we'd just walk. Flying all that way with you earlier has made me rather tired.”

“I'm sorry!”

“Oh, it's not your fault! Means I'll sleep well tonight, anyway, which is...not a common occurrence. The gardens are this way,” he added. “That's where  _ my _ pet lives! Her name is Bubbles.”

“You said she was a...water dragon,” Patton remembered. “What exactly is a water dragon? Because I don't think it could be the same kind of dragon that I've heard about.”

“Yes, Logan told me how humans have misconstrued dragons. Some of them are large and breathe fire, of course, and there are hunts for them when they get destructive--that's what my cousin Valerie does--but most are just small, magical reptiles. We keep them as pets. They're intelligent, but they're not sentient. A lot of them have wings, but water dragons’ wings are just tiny and their legs have turned into flippers.”

“They wouldn't try to eat Tom, would they?” Patton asked nervously, holding his puppy tightly.

“Don't worry, Bubbles only eats the little shrimp that live in her pond. This way!” Roman turned the corner and led them up a dark, narrow staircase that looked barely used. “I hardly ever go up this way, I usually just fly,” he remarked. “But it has to be wingless accessible.”

There was a door at the top of the stairs. Roman opened it, and sunlight came flooding in. As Patton's eyes adjusted, he saw rows and rows of flowers, stretching out across the garden. A pathway made of tiny stones wound its way through the plants. Grasses sprung up on either side of the path. Patton stepped out into the light and realized what he should have already guessed from going up stairs; the garden was situated on the very top of the palace. The view of it must have been blocked when they had flown up to the building.

Tom began wriggling in his arms, eager to be set down so he could run and play. He must have gotten over his fear of the suddenly giant plants. Patton let him down, placing him gently onto the dirt. When he looked back up, he saw that Roman had begun walking slowly between the rows of flowers.

“I'm one of the only people who spends much time up here,” Roman said quietly. Patton could barely hear him, and rushed to catch up with Tom bounding along at his feet. “When I was little, I wasn't allowed to leave the palace without several guards with me for protection, so I just stayed up here and pretended I was in the forest. Now that I'm a little older, I'm allowed to go out if Logan is with me. But I still stay up here a lot.”

“It's very pretty,” Patton said. They were passing through a sprawling patch of low to the ground purple flowers. He could see some rocks up ahead covered in moss and surrounded by ferns. The sound of rushing water became audible. “Is that the pond?”

“Yeah!” Roman got a skip in his step. “Come see Bubbles!”

As they got closer, Patton realized that the pond took up about a quarter of the gardens. It was bigger than he had expected, bordered by stones and with a small, cascading waterfall that bubbled up through a pile of rocks to spill down into the pond.

Roman sat down on one of the rocks at the edge of the pond, tapping the surface. “Bubbles!” he called. “Bubbles, come here, girl!”

Cautiously, Patton knelt down next to him. He gazed down into the water. There were several fish about the length of his forearm that swarmed in the water, their mouths opening and closing as they looked up at Patton. But as Roman kept patting at the water, the fish suddenly scattered and a strange grey and blue shape rocketed up from the depths. Patton gasped as it broke the surface and sent a splash of water up over him. “Oh!”

“Hi!” Roman said joyfully. “Oh, hi, Bubbles!”

The water dragon swam in circles. It was about the size of one of the little lizards that Patton would catch around the house and hold in his hands to pet their heads. Now, of course, that was about the length from his ankles to his waist. The dragon had tiny wings growing out of its back. Its tail was long and smooth, thick at the base and tapering off slowly. Both its front and back legs were flattened into a paddle shape. Its back and head were a shimmery dark blue-grey, with some speckles of bright blue. When it rolled over onto its back, Patton could see that its stomach was a pale cream color.

Roman was scratching at the reptile’s belly. It seemed to be enjoying it, rolling around and blowing bubbles from its nose. “See why I called her Bubbles?” he said. “You can pet her if you want.”

Patton glanced at Tom, who was staring at the water dragon in absolute shock. He had to laugh. “Oh, Tom. Roman promised that it won't hurt you!” The puppy jumped and retreated a few feet, then got distracted by sniffing at the base of a flower. Patton turned back to the pond and reached out carefully. The dragon stopped rolling and drifted up to poke her nose out of the water. Patton touched her snout swiftly and pulled his hand back with a yelp. “I touched a dragon!”

Laughing, Roman nodded. “You touched a dragon.”

“She's  _ smooth _ !”

“She has very smooth scales, yeah.”

The dragon blinked up through the water. Her eyes were bright green and intelligent, the pupils round. She opened her mouth, revealing rows of needle sharp teeth. Patton flinched before he realized that she was just blowing more bubbles.

“She won't bite,” Roman encouraged. “She's never bitten anyone, she's very well behaved.”

Getting more confident, Patton reached back down and put his hand all the way into the cool water to stroke the dragon’s neck. He could feel how strong the muscles under her scales were as she leaned into his hand. “Hi, Bubbles,” he said.

Roman leaned back on the rock, soaking up the last of the afternoon sunlight. His wings opened and closed lazily. “It's nice not to be all alone up here,” he said. “I like having a friend, especially one closer to my age. I love Logan, and Remy, but…”

“Roman?” Patton said. “If I did...become a fairy, if that could happen, what would I do?”

“Well, you'd come to live here, silly.”

“But what would I  _ do _ ?” Patton repeated. “I...I'm good at cleaning. I can bake bread, but I can't cook without burning things. I'm okay with plants, I tended the garden at home.”

Roman paused. “Well. You don't  _ have  _ to do anything, you know. You have the right to choose what you  _ want _ to do. But you're still a kid, anyway, even if humans age faster. Everyone in the city is provided for until they're twenty. But if you want to work, I suppose you can. What do you want to do?”

“I want…” Nobody had ever asked him that before. “Well, I've always wanted to take care of kids,” he said quietly. “Kids who don't have good places to live. I want to help them. But that was only ever a dream.”

“Fairies that were human once...can't have children of their own,” Roman informed him hesitantly.

“Oh, well...that's fine, I mean, I don't want that anyway. I just want…” Patton’s voice trailed off. He was still scratching Bubbles on her head and neck, and he gazed down into the water as he thought. “I want to give everyone a home who doesn't have one.”

“Kids who were like you. And...like me.”

Confused, Patton looked up at him. “What do you mean, like you? You have a home in the castle.”

“I wasn't born here,” Roman said. “Like I said, fairies that were human once can't have children of their own. My father was a human once. I…” He paused. Something told Patton that this was painful for him to talk about.

“I'm listening,” said Patton softly.

“I was abandoned in my hatching circle,” Roman admitted.

“I...I don't know what a hatching circle is.”

“It's a ring, like a fairy ring but it's built by the parents of the egg, and the egg stays in there until the baby hatches and then the baby stays until their wings dry,” Roman explained. “But sometimes, the parents don't want to keep the baby, and they leave it in the circle instead of watching over it.”

“And that's what happened to you?” Patton asked.

“Yeah.” Roman could hardly look at him. He looked ashamed. “The Queen found me. I was lucky. Most abandoned babies don't survive, or they're found and taken in by someone to be a servant. And nobody likes them. They're discriminated against, Logan says. But my mother, the Queen, she raised me like her own son. But that's why my wings look like they do. Everyone else in the royal family has monarch wings, but mine are just...question marks.” He shook his head and tried to smile. “No, really. The butterfly is a question mark butterfly, and it's a mystery where I came from.”

“It's a strange coincidence,” Patton agreed.

“Yeah.” Roman cleared his throat. “Well, anyway, there are lots of babies who are abandoned. And if you find one, it’s unwritten law that you can keep them, do whatever you want with them. So if you wanted to give them a home, you could.”

“I’ll take in all of them,” Patton declared. “I’ll make sure none of them are ever discriminated against ever again.”

Roman looked at him thoughtfully. “If anyone could help them all, it would be you. There’s something about you, Patton. I’ve never talked to anyone like you before, and not just because you’re the first human I’ve met. You’re different.”

Patton blushed. “I’m nothing special,” he said. “I’m...I’m  _ nothing _ , really. I’m not important or good or useful.”

“You’re wrong,” Roman told him. “And you’re not allowed to argue with me, I’m the Prince.”

Worried, Patton flinched. But the soft, amused glitter in Roman’s eyes said that he wasn’t really angry, so Patton relaxed slowly. “Sorry,” he whispered.

“It's okay! So, tomorrow morning, I'll come and fetch you and bring you to talk to my parents. And then Logan and I will teach you everything you need to know for the ceremony the next day,” Roman said. “There isn't a lot of responsibility. Mostly you're just supposed to be there as a guest...though you will need clothing that's a bit more dressy, and there's a few etiquette things, but it's all really easy, I promise. You'll do just fine.”

Patton looked at the bandages over the burns on his arm. “I don't know, I'm not...well, I don't usually do things right. I always mess everything up.”

“You haven't messed up anything since I met you,” Roman said. “I really think you'll be okay.” He glanced up at the sky. “The sun is setting. I have to go to dinner. You can come with me if you like.”

“Oh, I…” Patton was torn. Part of him was screaming to go to the dinner, because there would be food there. But rationally he knew he was tired and a little overwhelmed, and the bed in his room had been so soft and comfortable. “Is it...is it okay, um, can I say thank you but, um, no thank you? I'm just...so tired, I…”

“That's okay, too, it was only an offer. I can have something sent to your room from dinner, if you want.”

“If it's no trouble?” Even if he didn't eat it, he could hide it. Everything  _ seemed _ fine, but he couldn't rule out the possibility that something would change and he would be held captive.

“No trouble at all,” Roman reassured him. “Come now, I'll go with you back to your room to make sure you don't get lost. The palace can be difficult to navigate, especially when you aren't flying.”

Patton picked up Tom and let Roman lead him back through the gardens after waving to Bubbles. The water dragon blew a few final farewell bubbles as they walked away.

Back in the guest quarters, Roman showed Patton where to find nightclothes in the wardrobe. They were soft grey silk, a long shirt and loose pants. The Prince had to hurry away after that, and Patton was left in the quiet room with the bubbling fountain and a sleepy puppy as his only company.

After changing into the nightclothes, Patton gingerly folded the tunic and pants and placed them at the end of the bed to change into tomorrow. He sat down on the bed, which was as soft as he remembered it. Tempted to fall asleep right then, he rubbed his eyes and went over to the fountain to have a quick drink. Tom had flopped over next to the fountain, looking quite tired.

“Poor puppy,” Patton murmured. “It's been a long, odd day, hasn't it?” He sat down and stroked the dog’s ears. “And you'll need something to eat tomorrow morning. Hopefully there's some kind of meat here, or we might have to take one of the fishes from Bubbles’ pond.”

Tom yawned, his sharp little teeth flashing white in the pale moonlight that came through the window.

There was a knock at the door. When Patton opened it, he found a covered plate on the floor. The person who had knocked was nowhere in sight, so Patton brought the plate inside and uncovered it. There were a few bits of roasted vegetable, a bread roll, and a couple slices of some sort of meat. Patton tasted it cautiously. It tasted like the meat of a chicken or turkey, so Patton assumed it was from a bird. He gave one slice to Tom, who made it disappear quite quickly.

Patton ate the vegetables and half of the other slice, saving the other half for Tom in the morning and the bread for breakfast. That and the plate of cookies and fruit from earlier was placed into an empty drawer in the wardrobe. Unable to resist, Patton took a cookie off the plate and bit into it. A smile spread across his lips. It wasn't  _ quite _ as good as the one that had still been warm, but it was still one of the best things he had ever tasted.

Tom let out a low whine and rolled over onto his back. Patton smiled. He knelt down to rub the puppy’s belly. “Time for bed, Tom? A real bed, not a dirty corner of a tiny room or a forest floor under a hut built of sticks. We'll sleep so well tonight.” He picked Tom up and put him onto the bed, then climbed up after him. He pulled the covers back and slid between the sheets, sighing at how soft they were. Tom nudged his face with his little wet nose and curled up on the pillow next to Patton’s head.

Patton closed his eyes and stroked the blankets under his fingers. He was so comfortable. He expected to fall asleep instantly, but ten minutes later, he was still awake. Tom was breathing steadily next to him. The sound of the fountain was soothing but unlike any sound Patton had fallen asleep to before. He felt out of place, a poor peasant boy in the palace of a fairy kingdom. There was no heavy snoring from his mother in the next room, no cacophony of night sounds in the forest, and no fear that something would grab him while he slept and hurt him. He was safe, but still sleep wouldn't come to him.

“Tom, I think I'll...go for a walk,” Patton whispered. The puppy didn't wake up. “That's right, you sleep. I'll be back in a few minutes.” He got out of bed, shivering in the night breeze that came in through the large open window.

Hoping he wouldn't get in trouble for leaving his room, Patton started walking through the hallways of the palace. He saw a few fairies making their way to their own rooms, but very quickly, the palace went quiet. Patton was alone. He leaned against a dark corner, still shivering even though he wasn't cold.

“So it is true,” a voice greeted him.

Patton whirled around, heart pounding, ready to make some excuse as to why he was out of bed, ready to defend himself and protect himself from whatever was about to hurt him.

But the soft chuckle from the white-winged sprite that followed made Patton think that maybe he wasn't going to be attacked. “Easy, there, honey! Not gonna hurt ya.”

“Hi,” Patton said cautiously.

“Hi,” they replied, tilting their head. They wore dark glasses. Patton couldn't see their eyes. “So it's true, the baby princeling found himself a little human trophy to bring home.”

“I…” Patton squirmed uncomfortably. He didn't know how to answer. He still wasn't sure if he should be afraid of this person or not.

“Okay, hun, you can relax now. I'm a friend of Prince Roman’s, mmkay? I'm Remy.” They held their silvery hand out. “A pleasure, li’l human.”

Patton shook their hand timidly. “I'm Patton.”

“Whatcha doing wandering around after dark, Patton?” Remy asked. “That's usually my turn to roam the halls.”

“Couldn't sleep,” Patton found himself saying.

“Mmm. Any particular reason?”

“It's just...so  _ new _ , and big, and everything is so  _ soft _ and clean,” Patton babbled. “And it's quiet and safe, so it's hard to relax and I  _ know _ that sounds silly but where I come from, I can't let my guard down so it's just...so strange for me! I'm sorry, I shouldn't be...you don't have to listen to me.”

Remy adjusted their glasses thoughtfully. “Now, it's okay, hun. You talk all you like, I'm here to listen.”

Patton’s lip trembled. “I just don't understand, first Roman and now you? Why are you being so kind?”

“Alright, where are you staying, little human?” Remy asked gently. “We'll talk on the way there.”

His heart skipping a beat, Patton looked behind him. “I...I don't remember which way I came from!” he said, distressed. “No! I don't remember!”

“Okay, alright, don't you get so worried about it. We'll find it.” Remy put their hand on Patton’s shoulder and started guiding him along. “Little human doesn't have a good sense of direction, hm? Me neither, me neither. I've gotten pretty good at getting around the palace, though.”

Patton sniffled and wiped his eyes. “I'm sorry, I'm so stupid, I'm messing up again.”

“Hush, hush, hush,” Remy said indignantly. “No talking like that. This sure isn't something to cry about, honey. But you are crying about it, which tells me there's something else, hm? It's not just that you don't remember where your room is.”

“‘m sorry,” Patton said again. He wasn't sure what he was apologizing for this time, but it was better to be safe than sorry.

“Listen, hun, you've got nothing to be sorry for. You're scared, huh?”

“Y-yeah.”

“You have nothing to fear from me, little human. Is this your room?” Remy tapped a door.

Startled, Patton realized that they had reached the guest room that he had been staying in. “Yeah! How did you…?”

“Pretty easy guess, since there are only a few guest quarters on this level and this side of the palace, and you probably didn't go up or down.” Remy opened the door for him and gestured him through. “Lay down and try to get some rest, ‘kay?”

Patton could hardly keep his eyes open as he stumbled over to the bed and curled up next to Tom. “Okay,” he whispered. “Thanks for helping me find my room.”

“Sure thing, little human. Sleep well.” The door closed.

Tom snuffled and wriggled over to cuddle into Patton's chest. Patton wrapped his arms around the puppy and held him like a plush toy. “Night, Tom,” he mumbled. “Love you, kiddo.” He fell asleep as Tom licked his cheek, smiling.


	6. At the Ceremony

The music was like nothing Patton had ever heard. Dressed in a much more extravagant tunic than the one he had chosen, a crown of tiny white flowers adorning his head, he was brought to a huge ballroom by a couple of young pixies with small, clear wings. The place was bustling with workers setting up long tables piled with more food than Patton had seen in his whole life. The musicians sat in one corner. Patton didn't recognize their instruments, but some had strings like a harp and some had keys like an organ, and there were flutes and small drums. 

Patton was told to sit in a small but ornate chair on the raised platform at the front of the ballroom. Nobody took much notice of him after that, though he saw many fairies sending him curious glances. One child with large grey and yellow wings ran up to him and whispered that they weren't supposed to talk to him. Patton told them that he didn't mind, but they just giggled and ran away again. So he sat there, a bit uncomfortable, as the ballroom filled up with guests.

He couldn't help but stare at their clothing and wings. Everything was just so beautiful. He truly hoped he wasn't being seen as rude--but everyone was staring at  _ him _ , too, when they thought he wouldn’t notice.  _ Where's Roman? _ he wondered. He got his answer very quickly.

A hush fell over the crowd as a few chords were struck on the keyed instrument. He remembered being told yesterday that when that happened, he should just sit very, very still and not make any noise. He practically held his breath. The crowd parted down the middle like a choreographed dance, creating a wide aisle. They all bowed as the king and queen stepped through the doors.

Patton was still stunned by their beauty and grace, even after meeting them yesterday. The queen was tall, her skin smooth and rich dark brown, her monarch butterfly wings broad and stately, an intricate silver crown on top of her short black hair. She was wearing a long black dress. Her husband had smaller wings, mostly white with some black and orange markings. He had a fairly simple brown tunic on, and his crown was plain and bronze. They walked up to the platform where Patton sat. The king took his seat and gave Patton a smile. Patton smiled back shyly as the queen stood up at the front of the platform.

Her speech was short but eloquent and flowery, talking about how proud she was of her son and how she knew he would make a wonderful king someday. She mentioned Patton briefly, saying she knew the presence of a human would bring her son good luck, just as it had for her sister years ago. She had turned to her husband briefly, and the crowd had laughed. “So without further ado, my son. Prince Roman!”

Roman walked into the ballroom. His head was held high, trying to look proud and confident, but Patton could tell that part of it was just nervous defiance. He was practically daring someone to say something about his bloodline and the circumstances of his birth. At the same time, he looked more royal than Patton had seen him look before. He stepped through the crowd with a practiced ease. He had been preparing for this his whole life, and it showed.

The ceremony passed quickly. Roman was officially declared an adult in the eyes of fairy court, and a second crown was placed on his head, a slim silver circlet that rested right on top of his gold one.

And then the music started again. Patton remained in his seat for quite a long time, watching the fairies dance and eat. He didn't know what he was allowed to do. Would someone shout if he stood up? Would they hit him?

Roman stepped out of the group of dancers, politely sidestepping an invitation to partner with a young, purple and blue winged girl. He rushed up to Patton. “Isn't the music good?” he said happily. “I tried to learn all the instruments, but I only ever was good at singing. Do you want to come dance?”

“I...I don't know how,” confessed Patton.

“That's okay, I'll teach you! I'm a great dancer.” Probably seeing that Patton was still unsure, Roman added, “Or we could just go eat something if you wanted?”

“Am I allowed?” whispered Patton.

“Of course you're allowed to eat, silly. Come with me, come on, it's okay.” Roman took his hand and led him down from the chair, pulling him along deftly amongst the dancers and towards the buffet. “The party goes on until sunset. It's a long time, but there's plenty of food and if you don't want to stay in the main ballroom, there's another room just over there--see the door? It goes into a smaller ballroom where there isn't music but there are tables and chairs set up, and lots of books, and a few quiet corners with cushions because some sprites and little kids might need to take naps during the day.”

Patton nodded. He had taken a plate, but was nearly overwhelmed by the amount of choices and the sheer volume of food in front of him. There were some pies filled with fruit, some with vegetables and meat, and some with different kinds of substances that Patton couldn't identify but smelled sweet. There were cookies and pastries, fresh fruit, breads of a variety of shapes and colors with spreads to match. There was so much food that Patton's stomach hurt just at the thought of trying to stuff himself with as much as he could eat.

“Are you okay?”

“I don't know what to eat,” Patton replied faintly. “There's so much of it.”

“Okay, um...here, let's see.” Roman made a few quick decisions, taking Patton's plate and filling it with a moderate amount of the food. “Start with that, okay? If you don't like something, you don't have to eat it, and if you want more, go ahead.”

Patton took his plate back, thankful that Roman had taken charge. “Are you going to get in trouble for spending so much of your time with me? Are you supposed to be doing something?”

“It's a party, I can spend my time with whoever I want! And I want to spend my time with you,” Roman said earnestly.

“Th-thank you.” Someone bumped into Patton and he flinched, barely registering their apology as they kept walking. His heart started pounding as he reacted, fear gripping his mind as he stammered out an apology of his own, not realizing that the person who had bumped him was already out of earshot. He shrank backwards, taking up as little space as possible.

“Patton?”

He only vaguely heard Roman say his name. Patton started backing away. “I'm sorry,” he said. “I'm sorry, I'm in the way, I'm doing it wrong, I'm so sorry!” Holding his plate tightly so he didn't drop it (it would shatter and make everything worse, worse, worse, and broken plates hurt so much to fall on top of when he was struck to the ground), he fled towards the door that Roman had pointed out.

In the smaller ballroom, he could take a breath. There were very few people there, most curled up asleep on the cushions or reading intently. Nobody was talking in a voice louder than a soft whisper, and a few other people had plates and were sitting at tables and eating. Patton sat down at an empty table in the corner and put his head down on his arms next to his plate, breathing slowly.

After a minute, he was able to lift his head and eat a few bites of what was on his plate. Roman had chosen excellent food for him--though Patton would probably have thought any of the food was excellent. It was fully cooked and not rotten, after all.

“Prince Roman sent me in here to check on you.”

Patton jumped in his seat as the tutor stepped into his line of vision. “S-sorry, I-I-I-I-I was just--”

“You have no need to apologize,” Logan interrupted. “You have done nothing wrong. Prince Roman was merely concerned about your well-being. Since you are clearly fine, I will return to him.” His tone and the way he refused to look Patton in the eye was strange. It had been like that yesterday as well, when he had been teaching Patton about the ceremony.

“Um, sir?” Patton said nervously. “D-did I do something to offend you? I'm very sorry if I did, I promise I didn't mean anything by it--and I'm sorry, I can just tell you don't want to talk to me or spend any time with me, and that's alright, of course. I understand. I just wanted to apologize...in case I did something wrong, so...so I don't do it again.”

Logan paused, and then sighed. He walked back towards the table. Patton flinched before realizing that the tutor was just pulling a chair out to sit down. “ _ You _ have done nothing to offend me, Patton. Indeed, you have been surprisingly untroublesome in our palace. But the fact remains that you are a human, and humans have no place in the fairy world.”

“Wasn't the King a human once?”

“That is true. He was transformed over two hundred fifty years ago, and no human has entered our land since.” Logan crossed his arms over his chest. “Having a human present at a coming-of-age ceremony was considered an antiquated tradition even then. It is wholly unnecessary today. The relationship between fairies and humans was once far stronger, the veil between us much thinner. That has changed, over thousands of years. It is now...unwise for a fairy to enter the human world, or vice versa.”

“Why?” Patton found himself asking. “What happens? Roman told me about the disintegrating part, which is awful, but a fairy has an entire year before that happens. A year is such a long time!”

A strange look passed through Logan's eyes. “Yes, a very long time. But humans are clumsy and cruel. It is not...within the realm of impossibility that a human who comes across a fairy in the human world would take advantage of the fairy--hurting it, or trapping it and keeping it as a spectacle. Humans are untrustworthy. It is far wiser to keep a complete separation between the two races.”

“Why did you let me come here, then?” asked Patton.

“Let you? As if I had a choice in the matter.” Logan shook his head. “No, Prince Roman gets what Prince Roman wants. Prince Roman wanted a human at his ceremony, so we found a human.”

Patton hesitated. “Sir, did Roman tell you…”

“Did Roman tell me what?” Logan asked.

Patton wasn't sure if it was a good idea to confide in Logan. The tutor didn't like humans, and even though he had been mostly calm, Patton couldn't rule out the possibility that he might become violent. But on the other hand, Logan was intelligent and seemed knowledgable about humans. He might know more about what Roman mentioned, about how a human could become a fairy.

“Did Roman tell me what?” Logan repeated, his voice getting sharper.

Flinching, Patton said, “That he wants me to stay!”

“What do you mean?”

“That…” Patton fumbled for words. He ran his fingers over the wood of the table. “That I can't go home. He says there's a way for a human to become a fairy, that I can...become a fairy.”

“It is technically possible, but...why?” asked Logan. “You said you can't go home, why is that?”

“I…” Patton blinked, trying not to cry. He wrapped his arms around himself.

“Why are you afraid?”

“I can't go home,” Patton said. “I'm not safe there, and Roman said I could stay here. And be safe. And nobody would hurt me.”

Logan tilted his head. There was something soft and understanding in his eyes, which Patton hadn't expected from him. “What is waiting for you at home, Patton?”

Patton glanced around the room. He didn't want anyone else listening. “Bad things. Bad people.”

“Patton.” Logan leaned forward slightly. “I understand that what I said about not trusting humans...might make it difficult for  _ you _ to trust  _ me _ . But humans can be cruel to each other as well, and you are only a child. If you will be in danger if you return to the human world, I will do my best to ensure that will never happen.”

“Oh...okay.” Slowly, Patton rolled up his sleeve to show Logan the bandages there. “And...there's more on my ribs. My mother did it to me. She punishes me...and makes me sleep in the forest, sometimes for days. Roman told me that she shouldn't have done that even when I did things wrong. And if she learns about Tom, she'll hurt him, or at least not let me keep him. I'm saving coins to run away but I never knew where I'd go, just that I'd go far, far away.”

“I see.” Logan reached across the table and touched Patton's arm gently. “I will tell you what I know about how to perform that transformation.”

“Really?” Patton exclaimed. “Oh, thank you!”

“It is not easy,” Logan warned. “It involves a dangerous journey to a faraway valley, and you must reach it before your month is over, or it will be too late. And the forest isn't safe anymore. It hasn't been safe for a long time.”

“What's in the valley?” Patton asked.

“The end of the rainbow,” answered Logan.

Patton scrunched up his face. “What do you mean? Like the old stories about the pot of gold?”

“There is no pot of gold, of course. That would be ridiculous. But at the end of the rainbow in this valley is something far more valuable. The valley is a perfect circle, or as close as nature can get. As you are aware, perfect natural circles are where the veils between worlds are the thinnest. And rainbows hold a special kind of magic, a magic of transition and transformation, the sign of rain turning to sunlight,” the tutor explained. “Standing under the end of a rainbow in this valley can shift a human into being fairy-kind, to belong in the fairy world as much as any naturally born fairy.”

“Could it happen the other way around?”

Logan frowned. “Hm?”

“If a fairy stood under the rainbow, in the same valley, but in the human world, would the fairy be turned into a human?” Patton asked.

“I am unsure. I do not know if it has ever happened before. It is possible, but there is much less residual magic in the human world. Perhaps it is possible, and perhaps not. I see no reason why anyone would want to attempt it.” Logan glanced over his shoulder at the other ballroom. “I should return to Prince Roman. Will you be alright alone?”

Patton nodded. “I'm alright. If it's no trouble, will you tell Roman that I'm sorry for...for running off?”

“I will tell him. Farewell, Patton.” Logan walked away. His wings were folded tightly behind him as always, hiding the bright blue markings on the inside.

_ A rainbow in a valley far, far away, _ Patton thought to himself.  _ Sounds like something out of a fairy tale. _ Then he giggled quietly.  _ That's because I  _ am _ in a fairy tale. A real fairy tale, with real fairies. How did this happen to me? _

Patton slowly finished eating everything on his plate. He pushed down the rise of fear in his chest because he hadn't saved any for later, reminding himself that he had already hidden food in his room.  _ But what if someone came and took it? _ No, the fairies wouldn't do that, would they?

Carrying his plate carefully, Patton rushed back into the main ballroom. He looked around, trying to spot Roman. Weaving through the wings and bodies, staying near the edge of the room, he finally spotted Roman talking to Remy, the white-winged sprite he had met the other night.

“Patton!” Roman said happily. “Are you okay? I was so worried when you ran away.”

“I...I'm okay, but...Roman, I…”

Roman frowned and gently took Patton's plate from his shaking hands. “You look scared. Is something wrong?”

“I hid food in my room,” Patton blurted out. “Would someone take it if they found it?”

“What?” asked Roman.

Remy stepped forward. “Nobody's gonna take your food, little human,” they said reassuringly. “But you don't have to hoard it here. You can get more food whenever you want. It's okay, honey. You're never gonna go hungry here.”

Patton tried to relax. He tried to believe Remy. But even though Remy seemed to understand what he was saying, more than anyone else did, Patton couldn't quite make himself trust it. “I-I-I'm sorry.”

“It's okay,” Remy repeated.

“I've been giving Tom all the meat I've been given, I didn't know if I could ask for more, and I've been worried about him all day, ever since I left to come here, even though I know he has food and water and he should be fine, he's safe and this isn't the forest, but…” Patton shivered. “I talked to Logan and he told me about the rainbow and the valley but I don't know how to get there and I don't know what to do, and I'm so sorry--”

Roman grabbed Patton's hand. “Hey, it's alright! Patton, do you need to leave? Do you need to go back to your room?”

“ _ No _ , I'm not allowed to leave! I'm not going to mess this up, I promise!” Patton wailed. A few fairies were staring at him.  _ Oh no, no, I'm making a scene, I'm being disruptive, they're all going to be so angry! _ He didn't want to ruin this, but he couldn't stop apologizing. “I'm sorry! I'm sorry, I'm being too loud, I'm so sorry, please…”

“Hush, little human. Come with me now, it's alright.” Remy was whispering to him, leading him through the crowd and shoving everyone else out of their way. “Nobody is going to hurt ya, and you aren't doing anything wrong.”

“But I am, I am, I'm messing it up and I'm so sorry! No, I'm not supposed to leave, I'll be good, I promise!”

They were outside the ballroom now, and Patton was sobbing. Remy urged him on a little further, turning a corner and then tugging a tapestry aside to reveal a small nook in the wall and a window. There was a soft green rug on the ground, which Patton fell down upon to cry.

“Ya just got a bit overwhelmed, little one,” Remy told him. “Nobody's gonna be mad ‘cause you needed to get away. You're not in trouble.”

“But I-I-I'm supposed to b-be there for g-good luck,” Patton managed. “For R-Roman.”

As if he had summoned the young prince, Roman came stumbling in behind the tapestry to join them. His wings fluttered to balance himself as he dropped to the ground. “Patton, don't cry!” he pleaded.

“I'm s-sorry!” Patton said, sobbing harder. Roman was disappointed in him for breaking down, but he couldn't stop. Was he really losing his first ever friend so quickly?

And then Roman was hugging him. Patton had a moment of panic before he realized that Roman wasn't trying to restrain or hurt him. It was a bit unsure and clumsy, but Roman was patting his back and swaying a little to calm him down.

“It's okay, Patton, really it is. Everyone gets scared sometimes. Nobody's mad. Shh, you don't have to cry.”

“I'm sorry,” whimpered Patton, out of habit more than anything else.

“Rem, he's so upset, what do I do?” Roman asked worriedly. “You always know what to do when I'm upset.”

“Just let him calm down,” the sprite advised. They were kneeling down as well, reaching out to touch Patton's shoulder. “He's gonna be just fine if we give him time to come down from the freak-out, princeling.”

Patton hiccupped, needing to wipe his eyes but not wanting to ruin the gorgeous tunic he had been lent. Remy produced a handkerchief from somewhere out of their silvery-white shirt and handed it to him. Silently, Patton wiped his eyes and took a few breaths.

“I'm sorry, I've ruined everything, haven't I?” he whispered.

“No, you haven't ruined everything!” exclaimed Roman.

“You're just a kid, Patty-cake,” Remy said affectionately. “You just got a bit stressed out at the party, nobody's gonna blame you.”

“I'm not much younger than Roman--and I was supposed to be there for luck, and now I must have ruined it!” Patton thought that maybe he shouldn't be arguing, but he had to make them understand. He had  _ messed up _ , cried and made a scene when there was nothing to cry about. Someone was going to be angry about it.

“Princey's just a kid, too,” Remy said.

Roman looked like he might want to refute that statement, but he stayed silent.

“And Patton--hey, look at me, li'l human.” Remy was still keeping their voice quiet. “Not one person is gonna yell at you or get mad at you. I know it's hard to believe, kid, but it's true.”

“But then what happens when I mess up?” Patton needed to know. He could take whatever punishment it was, but he wanted to know about it beforehand.

Remy sighed. “If you really do mess something up, you'll get told how to do it next time and someone will help ya to put it right. But no one here is gonna hurt you like they did back where you came from. Not one person.”

Patton understood what they were saying, but he still didn't believe it. “If you say so,” he said doubtfully.

“I do say so. Now, how are you feeling? Wanna go back to the party, or do you think you'd rather go to your room and rest?”

_ Which one is the right answer?  _ Patton wondered, staring at Remy with confusion.  _ Maybe I'm supposed to go back to the party because it's why I'm here. Or am I supposed to go to my room because they don't want me messing up more than I already have? _

“Either way is fine,” Remy added eventually. “It's your choice.”

“I-I want to stay at the party,” Patton ventured. “I want to be good and do what I'm supposed to.”

For a second, Remy looked like they were frustrated by that answer, and Patton was about to retract it hastily. But then Remy softened and patted Patton's hand. “Sure thing, little human. Just let me know when you're ready and I'll walk back with ya.”

“I'm ready now,” Patton said.

“Are you sure?” asked Remy.

Patton nodded. “I'm ready now, I'm okay.”

Roman and Remy helped him to his feet and led him back to the ballroom. “Patton, do you want to dance?” Roman said.

“Dance?” echoed Patton. He shifted from foot to foot. “I don’t know how to dance, I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, I can show you! Only if you want to, though.” The Prince extended a hand. “We’ll start really easy. Do you like the music?”

“Uh-huh! But I don’t know how, what if I step on your feet?”

“Oh, I don’t mind!”

Patton let him take his hand and walked onto the open expanse in the center of the ballroom where several other pairs were dancing. It didn’t look  _ too _ hard, though some of them were also incorporating flying into the dance. “How do I start?”

“We’ll stay on the ground, of course. Here, put your hand on my shoulder! Then step to the left, then forward...there you go! Okay, now back to the right.” Roman led him through the basic steps with ease. He seemed to know exactly what he was doing. “Yeah, like that! And now let’s speed it up a little, so we’re in time with the music. There. Left, forward, back. Left, forward, back. See, you’re doing great!”

“You’re really good at this,” Patton said shyly.

“I love dancing,” Roman replied with a smile. “You’re a good partner. I’d never have known you didn’t know how to dance before now.”

In that moment, Patton decided that he also loved dancing.

Over the next hour or so, Roman showed him how to do twirls and how to move around the dance floor while still following the correct steps. Patton did his best to follow along. For a while, he wasn’t thinking about his mother, or his earlier breakdown, or everything that might await him. He only had to think about the placement of his feet and the feeling of Roman’s hand in his.


End file.
